Deputy Housekeepers
by Mickis
Summary: After taking April’s advice, Splinter puts together a list of chores for his sloppy sons. Only when running the underground household by themselves will the turtles truly learn what it means to master your environment.
1. It can't be that bad

**Disclaimer:** As usual, don't own the turtles or any of the mirage characters, sadly enough.

**A/N:** _The idea for this story came to me when my mom got a message from her doctor to slow down. She's extremely pregnant and might risk loosing her baby if she overstrains herself. So she turned to her family for help (us three oldest kids and my dad). Of course we agreed to help her (I mean c'mon - she's pregnant for Pete's sake) so she hands over this huge list of the things she does around the house. We're left alone to decide on who does what, and - well you guessed it - the whole thing was a complete disaster. However, I figured it would make a great story, so at least **something** good came out of it, right?  
With that said, I would like to thank my overworked mother for inspiring me to write this story. Hope you all enjoy it, and don't forget to review._

* * *

**DEPUTY HOUSEKEEPERS**

by

Mickis

**Genre: **General/Humor

**Language:** English

**Censor: **PG13 (better to be safe than sorry, right?)

**Summary:** _April's fed up with Splinter having to clean up after his four sloppy sons, and encourage him to write them a list of chores. Splinter's list comes out a lot longer than expected, and our heroes learn what it **really** means to master your environment._

* * *

Chapter 1 - "It can't be that bad."

April climbed down the ladder to the turtles' entrance, skipping the last two steps. Her heels clicked against the concrete floor once she landed, making her arrival official. The lair seemed empty, since no one came to greet her, or search her for any food, and April's eyes suspiciously travelled across the open space known as the 'living room'. It was quiet - alarmingly quiet.

"Guys?"

The subway station was never this peaceful, at least not if her green friends were around. She held her plastic bag in her right hand, letting her other hand travel down the iron-banisters as she descended the stairs leading to the main platform.

"Miss O'Neil," the old rat greeted, peeking up from behind the scruffy couch.

"Woah!" the brunette shrieked at his sudden appearance. She placed her left hand on her chest in an attempt to slow down her hysterical heart, which by know was halfway through its own drum solo. Once she realized it was only Splinter, her breathing calmed down, as did the drums. "I'm sorry, you scared me," she breathed, removing her hand from her chest and walking closer to her old friend.

The rat nodded in understanding, before disappearing behind the couch again.

"I thought you were a burglar or something," April explained.

"In the sewer?" Splinter popped his head up, his ears pointing upwards in puzzlement.

April realized her mistake and smiled sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess there's no need for an alarm system down here." She curiously peeked over the old couch, finding the old ninja master on all four. "What are you doing down there?"

"Cleaning," the rat explained as he reached in under the sofa with his arm.

"Well.." April didn't like the idea of the old man on the floor. "You want me to help?"

"That will not be necessary," Splinter said as he grabbed his wooden cane and rose to his feet, revealing leftovers from an old pizza slice in his paw. "I have it."

"You really think you should be doing that?" April questioned, her eyes following a pair of flies floating around the shrivelled piece of food, if you could even call it that.

The rodent's furry eyebrows shot up in wonder.

"I mean.." April awoke from her stare. "Shouldn't the others take care of that?" She pointed to the matter at hand, her face twisting in disgust.

An amused smile broke out on Splinter's hairy features. "I appreciate your concern, Miss O'Neil," he said, bowing slightly. "But I am afraid teenagers have an irreversible habit of leaving things around themselves."

"Yeah.. the memory from when you stayed at my apartment's still fresh," she frowned slightly, looking back on the mess she came home to everyday when all six of them lived under the same roof. If she had a penny for every time she tripped over their stuff when paying her nightly visits to the bathroom... well, let's just say Oprah Winfrey wouldn't be the richest woman alive.

Splinter smiled at his guest, admiring the patience she had with his four sons. They had taken the term 'make yourself at home' a little too serious, and certainly used her hospitality to its outmost possible. Still, she had never asked them to leave, oddly enough.

"But don't you think they're old enough to clean up after _themselves_?" She stared intently at the old father.

"I agree," Splinter nodded. "They have been old enough for quite some time now, only they choose to ignore my instructions out of comfort." Splinter excused himself and went inside the kitchen sub-car to throw out the piece of rotten food he sadly still held in his hand.

April stayed by the couch, clutching the bag of DVD's in her hand. "You want me to talk to them?" she called into the kitchen.

"You needn't worry, Miss O'Neil," the answer came from the sub-car.

The stubborn reporter followed him into the kitchen, where she found him by the sink, sorting out piles of dishes. "Are you sure?" she asked, stopping in the doorway. "Because they're more than capable of cleaning up after themselves."

Splinter rolled up his sleeves and began to fill the sink with water. "I am sure," he replied, glancing over his shoulder before grabbing a dirty plate and dropping it into the pool of water. He used the old dish-brush to scrub off the dried food, only to accidentally send a piece of waterlogged cereal onto his face. His ears noticeably stroked backwards in irritation as he wiped his cheek clean with the back of his hand.

"Well, then at least let me help you," April offered, leaving the bag on the messy table and walking up to stand beside the old rat.

Splinter nodded to express his gratitude as he handed her the clean plate. April washed it off underneath the tap, before placing it on the dish drainer. The two of them continued in the same manner, Splinter washing the plates in the almost brown water, while April washed off the traces of the washing-up liquid, adding the object to the tower of porcelain.

Soon the two of them were finished, and April wiped the table with the dish-cloth while Splinter enjoyed the luxury of sitting down and doing nothing.

"I still think you should talk to them," April said, hanging the dish-cloth over the tap when she was done.

"Perhaps you are right," Splinter considered, his expression thoughtful.

April leaned her back against the counter, smiling victoriously. "I know I am. In fact, why don't you write them a list of the chores you do, and then let them decide between each other how to divide them."

The old rodent thought for a minute before looking up at his helpful guest. "I will take your proposal under consideration."

April smiled in response, happy to have made some impact on her tired friend. The poor guy deserved some rest, and it was about time the turtles grew up.

The peaceful silence was however rudely interrupted by the four mentioned teenagers' return. Their happy voices chattered loudly, none of them listening to what the others had to say, as they walked into the living room.

April exited the kitchen to find out what her irresponsible friends were up to. All but Donatello had settled on the couch, and they instantly turned their heads in her direction once realizing she was there.

"April!" Michelangelo exclaimed happily, Leonardo and Raphael wincing beside him as his painfully loud voice numbed several of their senses. "What's cooking, dudette?"

"Just dropping by," she replied. "Oh, and I brought the DVD's I mentioned earlier."

All four faces lit up instantly, forgetting about the boring patrol they had just had.

"Alright!" Mike cheered, jumping up from the couch with a single question plastered on his face.

"They're in the kitchen," April revealed, stepping up to hog the spot he left behind on the couch. Leonardo and Raphael politely moved over to make room for her.

The orange masked turtle almost ran his father over on his way to the kitchen, and Splinter's whiskers twitched in annoyance as he entered the main room, holding onto his wooden cane as if it was a security blanket. April turned to Raphael who rolled his eyes over his brother's behaviour, something people usually did around Mike.

"Awesome! You brought 'Weekend at Bernie's'!" Mikey ecstatically called from the kitchen.

" ' Weekend at Bernie's'?" Donatello frowned from behind the couch. "C'mon Mikey, it's so childish. A couple of idiots dragging around some corpse on the beach? I mean that's just--"

"Ooh! 'Chicken Run'," Mike interrupted his brother's ranting, while looking through the bag.

"Really?!" Don squealed happily, hurrying inside the kitchen to have a closer look at the movie.

Leonardo shared a small smile with April, who had already forgotten that she was mad at them for making their old father clean up after their lazy asses.

While Mike and Don investigated the bag further, Splinter took a seat in his chair, resting his cane against its side. "Everything went well?" he asked, looking at his two remaining sons.

"Yes, master," Leo informed. "It was very calm tonight, and the only thing we came across was a purse snatcher."

Splinter nodded in approval, leaning slightly deeper into his chair.

"So what did _you_ do?" Raph asked, reaching for the remote control on the old coffee table.

"I used the time you were absent to clean up the kitchen," Splinter replied, silently recalling the tower of dishes they had left.

April, who immediately remembered how pissed off she was, sent the turtle in red one of her infamous looks. It was the same glare a big sister would give her little brother when finding out he had read her secret diary.

Raph felt her eyes bore into him and turned around with a confused look on his face. "What?" he exclaimed, his voice claiming innocence to whatever she was about to accuse him of.

"Aren't you gonna apologize?" she asked, doing her very best to keep her temper in check.

"What for?" Raph wondered, sharing a confused glance with his brother in blue.

This only infuriated the Homo Sapien even more, and she tiredly shook her head, as if she couldn't believe what she was hearing. "You honestly don't know?" She glared at Raphael, waiting for his coin to drop.

Raph silently thanked God for not giving him any sisters, because women were clearly missing something in the head office. One moment they could be the sweetest thing alive, and then the next, turn into Satan's long lost daughter. He figured it was a result of watching too many shows like 'Dr Phil'. Because only a woman would take his bullshit seriously. "No, I don't," he finally answered, preparing himself for the worst.

April grunted in frustration, realizing all men were the same - no matter what specie.

"April," Leo carefully asked, putting a hand on her tense shoulder. "What's wrong?"

April turned to look at Leo, who just like Raph, had a confused look in his eyes. "Do you really think it's fair that your father has to clean up after you?" she outburst, her arms waving in the air to make her point. Leo's baffled expression remained frozen, and April turned to Raphael, who even he seemed lost. "Don't you think you're old enough to clean up after yourselves?"

There was a moment of silence, where Raph wished he could still crawl into his shell like he did when he was little. "...Sure," he finally said, not being able to think of anything else. There were very few people in the world that were able to make him speechless, and April was obviously one of them, or at least her femaleish temper.

Splinter noticed how Donatello and Michelangelo's chatter quieted down in the kitchen, and assumed they must have heard April, just like the rest of New York.

"When I came down here, your father was crawling on the floor, looking for something that could've only been a really old pizza slice," April continued, this time not as loud as before.

"Hey, don't blame me," Raph said, holding up his hands to prove his innocence. "That's Mike's department."

Everyone turned their gaze to the kitchen door, waiting for the guilty to confess his crime. However, there were no sight of any orange turtles, or his purple brother for that matter, since only silence followed Raphael's statement.

"Michelangelo," April finally said, intently staring at the kitchen door.

"Yeah..?" a humble voice came from inside, where both chickens hid, hoping that if they didn't speak no one would remember they were there. Their brilliant plan had obviously failed.

"Come here," the reporter ordered, her eyes locked on the door way.

There was a muffled objection from Donatello, who instantly protested when Mike tried to drag him with him, not wanting to take the fall alone. But a few seconds later they both appeared in the living room, Don walking a few steps behind his stiff brother.

"Yeah?" Mikey used his best smile, hoping it would charm April and make her forget about why she was mad.

"You think it's fair Splinter has to clean up after you?" Her eyes pierced into his.

Mike knew it was one of those questions you had to answer carefully. "No," he replied.

"What about you, _Donatello_?" she specifically emphasised his entire name to express her anger extra clear. "Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"

"..Yes," Don managed to let out, his eyes nervously glancing around the room.

April scowled each one of them. "So you're going to change, then?" It wasn't much of a question.

"Of course," Leo answered, glancing at his master, who - if he wasn't mistaken - seemed to enjoy himself. Because even if he wasn't smiling, he could still catch the sadistic spark in his eyes, which wasn't like his loving father at all. "I'm sorry, master," he apologized, bowing his head in respect.

"Apology accepted," Splinter nodded, as the rest of his sons said their 'I'm sorry's'.

April's stance relaxed as her friends had stepped up to their mistake and apologized to their master, but there was still one thing left on her mind. She turned to Splinter. "I still think you should write them that list," she said, causing four pairs of confused eyes to look at her.

"What list?" Mikey asked, almost a little frightened.

April ignored him and kept her eyes locked on the resident rat. "If you want, I can help you," she offered.

"That will not be necessary, Miss O'Neil," Splinter replied. "However I will take your advice and put together a list of chores."

"A list of chores?" Mike once again voiced his worry, while the other three exchanged fearful glances. Whatever list that had the word 'chores' in it, did not bode well.

"Yes," Splinter confirmed, turning to Michelangelo. "Miss O'Neil here kindly advised me to write you a list of the things that need to be done here, to learn you the importance of responsibilities, and perhaps even allow myself a break."

"Really? She did?" Raph questioned, turning his dark eyes to April. "How very nice of 'er.."

April realized she wasn't going to be on their popular list from here on, but she didn't care. Splinter deserved his rest, and they would come around soon enough - they always did.

"Well, in that case," she said, rising from the couch, not wanting to sit in between Leo and Raph any longer, now that they had decided not to like her. "I better leave you to it." The room remained silent, all four turtles glaring at her. "I'll just show myself out," she mumbled, stepping in between Raphael's legs and the coffee table. A few seconds later, the nosy reporter had left the building.

The outcast family sat in silence, with the faint sound of sitcom laughs coming from the TV, where 'Everybody loves Raymond' had just made a joke about his giant brother.

"So.." Michelangelo finally spoke. "When're you gonna write this.. list?"

"I will have it delivered to you before I go to bed," the rat answered, already planning out what chores to put on it. "Now, if you excuse me, I will be preparing dinner in the kitchen." With that, the old ninja master rose from his chair and went inside the sub-car.

The four brothers spent the following few seconds in silence, where everyone on their own tried to comprehend what they had just been informed.

"It can't be that bad," Donatello finally interrupted the silence. His brothers instantly turned to look at him. "I mean, how many chores can there be? And if we divide them between all four of us, it shouldn't be so hard."

They all nodded in response, thinking he made a very strong point.

"Yeah," Mike spoke up. "So we'll have to do the dishes and clean the lair, it's nothing we can't handle."

"Right," Leo agreed. "No big deal."

The four teenagers nodded at each other, having decided it wouldn't be so bad after all. Still they couldn't suppress that tiny hint of fear that lingered in the back of their minds. For they had all seen the sadistic look in Splinter's eyes when April told them off, and it was anything but calming to them.


	2. Hey, I cook all the time!

**Chapter 2 -** **"Hey! I cook all the time."**

Michelangelo and Raphael sat on opposite ends of the couch, each gripping a remote control connected to the X-box April bought them for Christmas. Raph held his eyes fixated at the TV, barely moving as much as a muscle on his face, while Mike's arms and legs had a life of their own, yelling at his player to do better.

"C'mon!" he urged. "Get up! Kick 'im! " But no matter how loud he yelled at the television, he was still having his ass kicked at 'Dead or Alive'.

Raph proudly leaned back in the couch when he won for the ninth time in a row. "Hurts, doesn't it?" He grinned at Mikey.

"It's only cuz you have a guy," Mike blamed, while watching the humiliation of his defeat replay itself in front of them in slow-motion.

"Can't ya just admit that you suck?" Raph snickered.

"I do not!" Michelangelo protested. "The guys are stronger than the girls," he insisted.

"Then why d'ya keep choosin' girls?" Raph countered, sitting himself upright for the next battle.

"Cuz their breasts bounce when they fight," the smaller turtle answered, a dirty smile curving his lips.

"Pervert," Raph mumbled, while choosing his player.

And so they were on to another round of beating Mike senseless, while he kept screaming at the TV for his player to fight back. Leo, who had been trying to read his book for the past thirty minutes, finally gave up and waltzed into the living room.

"What's going on?" he asked, standing behind the couch.

"Mike's loosin'," Raph answered under his concentration, his eyes glued to the screen.

"Really?" Leo's stern features broke into a smile, and he leaned forward on the back of the couch, his head in between his brothers. "What's the matter, Mikey?" he teased. "Not the number one anymore?" The two of them had earlier played the same game, and Michelangelo hadn't exactly been shy to point out his triumph, even performing a little victory dance for the loser (in this case Leo).

"Shut up," Mike hissed, while scooting closer to the television, his knees hitting the table edge in the process. "Ow!" he whined, regretting taking off his pads earlier.

Within the matter of seconds Raphael beat the last of his life out of him, adding another victory to his ego. "Can ya believe that?" he mocked. "Looks like I beat ya again."

"Very funny," Mike frowned, caressing his injured knees. "That one doesn't count."

"Unless ya play with yer knees, I think it does," Raph smiled, coaxing the control into Mike's lap. "Now c'mon, les finish this."

"I don't wanna play anymore," Mike protested, giving back his control to Raph.

"You saying yer givin' up?" Raph smiled evilly, matching Leo's expression.

There was a silent moment where the two brothers held their gazes locked at each other, much like in an old western movie, until Mike finally gave in and retrieved his control.

"Fine," he hissed, choosing yet another big breasted woman.

The fight began and Mike's life shrunk dangerously fast. Raph wasn't even giving him the chance to get back up and defend himself, and while Leo's smile grew wider, Michelangelo's frown deepened.

"Turn that off," Splinter suddenly ordered as he sat down in his chair, none of his sons even turning to glance at him.

"Inna minute," Raph mumbled, focused on beating up the animated half naked woman.

Mike, however, wasn't slow to hurl himself across the coffee table and hit the reset button, saving his ass from yet another beating. "Too bad I didn't get the chance to beat ya up," he smiled from the floor, happily turning off the TV and returning to his seat on the couch.

Leonardo and Raphael frowned, both of them having looked forward to Mike's ego hitting rock bottom.

"Coward," Raph grunted, while Leo stepped over from the back of the couch and sat down in between his siblings.

"Oh, c'mon, Raph," Mikey smiled. "Ya heard Splinter. It was totally outta my hands."

Raph only rolled his eyes in response, not even bothering to answer him.

"Where is Donatello?" Splinter interrupted their bickering.

"In his room," Mikey answered, turning to his master. "I'll get 'im," he offered and flew up from the couch to drag out his brother, who had spent the entire night sulking by his computer, cleaning it from the latest virus attack.

"It's the list, isn't it?" Raph asked, trying to hide his irritation while addressing his sensei.

"It is," Splinter confirmed, a small smile brightening up his face.

Soon the two missing turtles arrived in the living room, with Mike darting towards the couch, hogging the only seat left. Donnie sighed in defeat and sat down on the table, his legs stretched out on the floor. There was a dreadful silence as the four teenagers waited for the court to reveal their sentence, each one hoping they would get off as light as possible.

"I have finished the list," Splinter announced, looking to each one of his sons. "Now, before I pass it around to you, I have a couple of rules that apply to everyone."

The turtles nodded silently, feeling as if a dark cloud hung over their heads - and _their_ heads only, much like in a cartoon.

"You will not watch television unless you have made your beds and cleaned your rooms. I want it done everyday, and I will be very strict." Splinter paused to look at his students, realizing he had their attention in the palm of his paw.

It was a first.

"Secondly, I have divided you into pairs for your patrols," the rat continued. "Donatello and Raphael," he turned to the ones mentioned, "you will patrol Sunday, Monday and Tuesday." He noticed the disappointed expressions on their faces. He knew the two of them didn't spend much time together, and he had paired them up for that very reason. Besides that, they usually patrolled the city twice a week, so the extra work they had to perform contributed to their frowns. "Leonardo and Michelangelo," he turned to his sons on the couch. "the two of you will be responsible for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I expect you will work together and do your best."

"Yes, sensei," Leonardo nodded, with a pouting Michelangelo to his left.

"So, we only get Saturday off?" Mike asked, with many hints of disappointment on his voice.

"No," Splinter answered. "The four of you will patrol together on Saturdays. The city appears to be in its worst state on this particular night, and can certainly use the extra help."

"We have to patrol _everyday_?" Mikey whined, getting tired by just thinking about it.

"By taking turns you will each get the rest you deserve," Splinter simply replied.

"I think I deserve more than just three nights a week," Mike mumbled, earning an elbow from Leo in his side. "What?" he whined, turning to his brother in blue. "I do."

Splinter ignored his lazy student and reached inside the pocket of his kimono, grabbing onto the note everyone already feared. His four sons immediately sobered up once they noticed the piece of paper in his hand, and he had to suppress a smile when addressing them. "I will pass it around to the four of you, so that each person has his chance to choose the chores he thinks he's capable of, and I expect you will be fair to each other when dividing the list."

The four reptiles nodded silently, each staring at the object in his right hand, while imagining the horrible things written on it.

"Is there anyone who would like to begin?" Splinter wondered, his eyes inspecting all four students.

"Me!" Michelangelo chimed, his arm waving in the air to make his point. "I wanna!"

"Very well," Splinter said and rose from his chair. "I am going to retire now, so I trust you will solve this on your own." All four nodded. Splinter handed over the piece of paper to Michelangelo before bidding his sons good night and leaving for his bedroom. The smile he had fought so hard to hide surfaced once his back was turned to his pupils, and he did nothing to stop it.

* * *

Michelangelo's brown eyes travelled down the list, while doing his best to hide it from his curious brothers.

"What does it say?" Donatello asked, since he couldn't peek over his brother's shoulder from his position on the table.

"You wait your turn, dude," Mike said, holding the list as close to his face as possible. After a few seconds of reading, he finally spoke up to the others. "Water plants? We don't have any plants:"

"Then what do ya call that green thing over there?" Raph wondered, while pointing to a medium large fern by the foot of the stairs that lead to the main platform.

"There are lots of plants in Splinter's room," Leo informed, while trying to see what else was on the list.

"Well, I've sure never noticed 'em," Mike said, hiding the note from his curious brother.

"That's because you never water them," Donatello pointed out.

"Touché," Mikey said with a smile. "Okay, well that sounds easy enough. Anyone's got a pen?" He looked between his three brothers.

"In my room," Don said and rose to get it.

"What else are ya gonna do?" Raph asked, trying to act as if he wasn't interested.

"Ya think I'll tell _you_ that?" Mike outburst, as if it was the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard.

"What, don't ya think I'll be able ta read it off that list?" Raph countered, pointing to the piece of paper Michelangelo clutched in his hands.

Before Mike had a chance to answer, Donnie returned with a pencil in his hand. "Here," he said, while handing it to Mikey.

Mike gripped the pen tight in his right hand and hid behind the piece of paper. There, safely protected from his brothers' curious eyes, he picked out the chores he wanted, or didn't hate as much.

"Finished!" he announced with a smile and sat straight up again, now that he didn't have to hide from his siblings anymore.

"Lemme see," Leo said and snatched the note from Mike. He quickly looked it over and noticed the three chores his lazy brother had put his name behind. "Oh, you've gotta be kidding me," he exclaimed while looking up from the list.

"What?" Mike asked with an innocent look on his face, as if he had no idea what Leonardo was talking about.

Leo looked back to the piece of paper in his hand and began reading Mike's choices out loud. "Water plants.. Supply list to April... _Morning practise_!"

"So?" Mikey asked with a blank look on his face.

"_So?_" Leo repeated. "You think _you_, the person that skipped practise because of a _supposedly_ cramp in the leg, is capable of supervising our morning practise?"

"It's not that hard," Michelangelo said, causing Leo's eye ridges to shoot up. "A kick here, a punch there, and a few words of wisdom to keep ya in shape."

"You really think it's _that_ easy?" Leo exclaimed, picturing Mike's five minute session in his mind.

"I think I can do it," Mike replied. "Plus, I picked first, so I don't think it's up to you to decide."

Leo looked to his other brothers for support, only to find none, as Donatello shrugged his shoulders, and Raph smiled happily. "Fine," Leo surrendered and turned back to the turtle in orange. "But you're not writing the supply list."

"What?" Mike outburst. "But that's totally my area. Don't tell me I don't eat the most."

"He's got a point there," Donnie agreed, and then turned to Mike. "But think about what we'll look like if _you_ feed us. We have to stay in shape, y'know."

"And that's why I'm also responsible for morning practise," Michelangelo explained, thinking the solution was obvious.

"Nuh uh," Leo disagreed. "I'm not folding on this one, Mike. We can't have you buy our food. It's just not possible."

"Fine," Mike pouted and crossed his arms. "So what am I suppose to do if I can't do that?"

Leo turned back to the list, his eyes quickly scanning it. "How about feeding Klunk and cleaning his litter box."

"What?" Mike frowned. "But why? That's so lame."

"Cuz it's your cat," Raph reminded him. "I sure as hell ain't cleaning up his shit."

"So Klunk it is," Leo decided, while snatching the pencil from a cranky Mike to rearrange the list. After having picked out the chores he wanted, he looked up from the list to the others. "So who's next?"

"Me," Don said and reached for the two items. After Leo handed them over to him, he immediately tuned in to his 'unreachable mode.' He closely read over the list, several times, before tightening his hold on the pen and scrabbling down his name on the note. Once he was finished, he passed it on to Raphael.

Raph pessimistically grabbed the pen and paper, before observing what was written on it. "Whatta hell's this?" he outburst and looked up from the piece of paper. "I don't get to choose anything!"

"Whaddid'ya think, dude?" Mike smiled. "You're the last one to the party."

"So?" Raph said. "Look, there's no way I'm cleaning the bathroom, doing dinner and dishes..." he looked back to the note in his hands before continuing. ".._and_ makin' breakfast?"

"Well, I'm sorry, Raph," Leo said. "But I don't think anyone's up for trading. We've all got our share."

"Like hell ya do," Raph hissed and turned back to the list. "I mean, look at Donnie." He angrily pointed to the piece of paper. "Supply list, putting everything in place.. and takin' out the trash, I mean c'mon!" He looked at Leo, who didn't seem to care that much.

"What?" Mike suddenly complained. "_Donnie_ get to do the groceries?"

"And what about Mike?" Raph angrily pointed to turtle at the opposite end of the couch. "Why can't _he_ cook?"

"Hey! I cook all the time," Mikey defended himself.

"Oh yeah?" Raph questioned. "Well I don't think orderin' pizza qualifies."

"Okay," Donatello spoke up. "So what if I switch my 'cleaning up the lair' for something of yours?" he offered.

This got Raph thinking. "I'll give ya breakfast," he decided, after checking the list again.

"What? Breakfast.. b-but I can't cook," Donnie whined.

"How hard can it be to make a couple a' sandwiches?"

"So why don't you do it then?" Don argued.

"Because I don't wanna get up that early," Raphael said, simply.

"Well neither do I."

"It was you who offered ta switch," Raph reminded his purple wearing brother.

"Fine," Don agreed, seeing no way out.

Raphael smiled and returned to the list, updating it with the pencil gripped in his right hand.

"So what do we got ?" Leonardo asked when he was finished.

Raph returned to the list and read it word for word to the others.

_"Breakfast and dishes - Donnie.  
Responsible for morning practise - Mikey.  
Polish weapons - Leo.  
Lunch and dishes - Leo.  
Water plants - Mikey.  
Feed Klunk and clean his litter box - Mikey.  
Clean bathtub and toilet - me.  
Supply list to April, and pick up groceries at her apartment - Donnie.  
Wipe and sweep - Leo.  
Put everything in its rightful place - me.  
Dinner and dishes - me.  
Take out the trash - Donnie."_

"Well that sounds fair enough," Leo said and reached for the list.

"Ya really think Splinter does all this stuff?" Mikey wondered. His three brothers turned to look at him. "I mean, I've never seen him wiping the floor."

"It's clean, isn't it?" Leo said, feeling the need to stand up for their father.

"Well, yeah.." Mike agreed. "But, I mean, c'mon Leo.. polish weapons? I don't know if you've noticed, but my chucks ain't that shiny."

"That's because you don't polish them," Leo replied, noticing Donatello and Raphael brightening up at the argument.

"Well neither does he," Michelangelo pointed out.

"That's not the point, Mikey," Leonardo said and rose from the couch. "This is about us helping out more and learning to take responsibility."

"Seriously, Leo, you don't think he's getting the_ least_ bit off at this?" Mike curiously looked at his brother with a wicked smile curving his lips.

"No," Leo answered. "I don't."

The three turtles then watched as their leader went inside the kitchen sub-car to put the note on the fridge. They shared a quiet smile in the oldest turtle's absence. They all knew Splinter enjoyed this more than he let onto, and even though Leo wouldn't admit it to their faces, he knew it, too.

This list wasn't just about taking responsibility. Splinter was teaching them a lesson, a taking a vacation while doing it.


	3. That's ten extra flips for you tomorrow,...

**Chapter 3 - "That's ten extra flips for you tomorrow, mister!"**

It was a calm Wednesday morning. The citizens of New York slept soundly in their beds as the warm sun peeked up behind the buildings. It would be hours before the sidewalks flooded with people, and the streets filled up with morning traffic. These few hours was the closest thing to peace you got in the city that never slept.

But it didn't apply to everyone.

Underneath the city, deep down the tunnels of the sewer, a certain mutant turtle awoke to the beeping sound of his alarm clock. He tiredly turned over on his mattress and read the digital numbers on the toy from hell.

5:00 am.

If it wasn't for the piercing sound he would have fallen asleep right there, just by thinking about how early it was. And he could swear the noise grew louder with every beep. Finally, Donatello lifted his arm and fidgeted after the button that would put an end to his misery. Once his room turned silent again he rolled over on his shell, his bloodshot eyes facing the carriage ceiling.

He knew what he had to do, even though he really, _really_ didn't want to.

After giving himself an inspiring pep talk, he finally found the strength to get out of bed and prepare today's breakfast.

* * *

Splinter worriedly turned over on his mattress, trying to take advantage of the extra hours of sleep he rarely got. Yesterday, when he went to bed, the list had seemed like such a good idea, but today... Today everything felt completely different.

His sons had to manage morning practise all be themselves, and he didn't even know who was up for the job. He suspected Leonardo had taken it on his responsibility to supervise the others during training, since none of the other had shown much interest in the importance of practise. But even if Leo was the one to lead the session, he couldn't calm down. Because if the other three didn't listen to the eldest turtle when he asked them to turn the volume down, or even get him a glass of water, what could possibly make _this_ situation any different?

And then there was breakfast. Sure, not many things could go wrong while making breakfast, but it wasn't like they had inherited loads of money from a wealthy uncle. They couldn't afford to burn the oatmeal, or spill the milk, like normal non-mutated families. There were so many things that could go wrong. Too many.

How would he ever be able to enjoy his lie-in if he couldn't stop worrying? Splinter nervously rolled over to the other side, facing his bedside table. If he listened closely enough, he could hear his sons' voices coming from the dojo. He tried to make out what they were saying, but because of the dojo being located on a different platform down one of the tunnels, he could only hear muffled words.

Finally, the old ninja master gave up and rose from his mattress. He put on his kimono and seated himself on the centre of the floor, his legs crossed and eyes closed.

If sleep couldn't get him through the morning, meditation had to.

* * *

Michelangelo studied his three brothers, lined up in front of him on his request. Sure, there had been some complaints when he asked them to, especially from Raphael, who had called the whole thing a power trip, but they had eventually obeyed him. He noticed none of his siblings looked very happy about the situation, and Donatello seemed to have trouble with keeping his eyes open, but Mikey wasn't going to let this bother him. In fact, he was unusually cheery today, even for him.

"Good morning, students," he greeted the others with a bow, just like Splinter did.

The replies came in form of rolling eyes and short words, a typical sign of irritation.

"My name is Michelangelo," he continued, patrolling back and forth in front of his groaning brothers. "I'll be filling in for master Splinter, I'm sure you all know him." He was met by blank faces. "Giant, talking rat that lives just down the ha--"

"We know him, Mike," Leo interrupted. "Cut to the chase."

"Okay, first of all, Leo-_nardo_," Mike said, stopping in front of the blue masked turtle. "A student must never interrupt his master."

Leo sighed inwardly. "You're not our ma--"

"Ah, ah!" Mikey made a 'no-no' gesture with his index finger. "You must not have heard me, sunshine. Now give me ten flips."

"What?" The eldest brother exclaimed. "Are you crazy--"

"You want detention, too?" Mike asked, his eye ridges rising.

Leonardo's voice died in his throat at Michelangelo's words. He couldn't believe his brother had even said it. This was not at all what he had imagined. He had pictured a couple of sit-ups and a lame pointless story Mike would share to teach them some weird lesson, but never this.

Raphael snickered at Leo's shocked expression.

Mikey instantly noticed this and turned to Leo's right, where Raph stood smugly. "You think this is funny?"

Raph's features instantly firmed. "Don't even think your little attitue' boost is gonna work on me, Mikey."

"After we've introduced ourselves to each other, you'll join Mr Big-mouth here for his back flips." Mike happily patted Leo on his shoulder. He then moved on to Donatello on Raph's right, who was two seconds away from snoring. "And then there's _you_." He stopped in front of the purple masked student, who's bloodshot eyes widened at his brother's behaviour. "What do ya think this is, a slumber party?"

Don immediately sobered up, his puffy eyes glaring at his little brother.

Mike, however, was in character and went on with his speech. "Didn't your parents teach you that it's rude to sleep on the job?"

"Well excuse me, Stalin," Don hissed. "But I've been up all morning preparing your breakfast."

"Was that _hostility_?" Mike said, dramatically putting his hand to his chest. "Didn't it sound like hostility to you guys?" He turned to his other two brothers, who didn't seem to share his amount of enthusiasm. "It think it was." He turned back to Donnie. "You better join the other two stooges for flip-lessons," Mike decided and turned around, leaving Donatello with his mouth open.

"Alright, so let's introduce us, shall we?" Mike turned back to his siblings again, watching their enraged faces from a safe distance.

* * *

Thirty minutes later, after the introductions, the flips and the mini marathon around the dojo, Michelangelo stood by the sideline with a tired Donatello, supervising his other two brothers as they sparred with each other.

Raphael took out the anger he felt towards Mikey on Leo, who not only didn't seem to mind, but also showed _his_ amount of fury, although not as much as Raph, of course. Instead of being patient and defensive, Leo's moves were of the more offensive kind, egging Raph all the more to attack. Not that he could do much harm without weapons, another rule their brother insisted on introducing.

"Raphy boy?" Mike called, causing his brother in red to turn to look at him. "Easy on the rage," he commented, winking his eye at Raphael, who growled in response before turning back to Leo.

Raph hurled himself at his older brother, who used his speed to judo-flip him over his back. Raphael landed hard on his shell, Leo instantly on top of him, keeping him from getting back up.

"Alright!" Mikey applauded, causing everyone's heads to turn his way. "Nice finale, gentlemen. Although you really _should_ do something about your anger, Raphael."

Raph, seemingly a tad pissed, pushed Leo off of himself, and they both rose to their feet.

"Okay, so kiss and make up," Mikey ordered, grinning wickedly.

"Hey, there are some things ya juz can't make me do," Raph said, angrily pointing at Michelangelo. "And incest is one of 'em."

"Chill out, bro," Mikey smiled. "It's a figure of speech."

"Yeah, well so is 'beat ya senseless'," Raph hissed. "But that doesn't mean I won't do it."

Mike's smile vanished from his lips, a little taken aback by his brother's threatening words, but then another smile grew right back on. "I think someone needs to brush up on his flips," he grinned, using his baby voice to improve the effect.

Raph glared fiercely at Michelangelo, feeling more anger boil up within him.

"Go on," Mike insisted. "You can flip away while your brothers engage in their own duel." Mike looked to his left, where a dozed off Donatello had closed his eyes, although still standing. "That means you, Don." Mikey nudged his brother, who's eyes instantly flew open. "You're up."

Donnie tiredly yawned, before strolling up to Leonardo on the mat. The two of them bowed at each other before beginning the fight. Meanwhile, Raphael angrily did his flips by the sideline, thinking about the many ways to get even with his little brother.

Michelangelo observed the entire thing from afar, happily waving at Raph before pointing out Don's slow movements.

* * *

Mike rose to his feet and walked up to the portable CD-player he had brought from his room, to back him up for his meditation session. He pushed the 'stop' button and took out the CD disc, placing it back in its cover. He then turned around to his three brothers, still cross-legged on the floor, each of them looking as if they had just sat through a four hour lecture.

"Okay," Mike said, fiddling with the cover in his hands. "That's enough for today."

The three guinea-pigs relaxed, and Don even let out a breath of relief.

"Oh, and if you think _this_ rocked," Mikey continued, "you just wait until tomorrow, when I bring my 'Songs of the dolphins' CD."

Leo and Donatello groaned at the bad news, while Raphael got up and left, his fists clenched at his sides.

"That's ten extra flips for you tomorrow, mister!" Mike happily called after him. He then turned back to his remaining students, only to discover he was the only one laughing. "You may leave." He bowed to complete the session.

Both of them flew up from the floor and followed Raph down the tunnel, trying to think of reasons why they shouldn't murder their little brother in his sleep.

Michelangelo blew out the candles that were placed on the floor and put them back on the equipment shelf against the wall. He then unplugged his CD-player and lifted it up in its handle. He paused for a second and looked back on the two hour practise that just took place, before he stepped off the platform and walked down the tunnel leading up the living area, humming the chorus to 'My heart will go on.'

* * *

Half an hour later everyone had showered and brushed their teeth. The family gathered around the kitchen table, where Splinter eagerly waited to hear about this morning's practise. Donatello brought out the milk from the fridge and placed it on the rectangular-shaped table.

"Very admirable, Donatello," Splinter complimented his son when he took a seat with the rest of them. "When did you find the time to prepare this?" He looked over the table that had been set with oatmeal, fresh toast, tea, coffee, cereal, and milk.

"I got up an hour earlier," Don replied, while pouring himself a much needed cup of coffee.

Splinter took a closer look at his son that sat across the table, and noticed the visible veins in his eyes. "I see," he said, leaning back in his chair. "Well, I am certainly impressed, and it looks delicious."

Donnie tiredly smiled at his master's kind words, before pouring the entire cup down his throat, ignoring the burning sensation that followed afterwards. He figured it was worth it.

"Yeah, Donnie," Mike commented as he reached for a slice of bread. "Ya sure know your stuff."

Splinter couldn't help but notice the others' reaction to Michelangelo's voice. Donatello and Leonardo secretly glanced at each other, while Raphael intensively buttered his bread slice.

"Oh," Mikey looked up, all of a sudden remembering something. "Who's in charge of the bathroom?"

"Me," Raph answered, his teeth gritted. "Why?"

"Well," Mike began. "I was the last one in the shower... and I kinda noticed how dirty the tub was. Totally grossed me out."

Raph accidentally cut the butter knife through his sandwich, obviously doing everything in his power to keep his temper in check.

"Anyway," Michelangelo continued. "I just thought you should know."

Raphael's knuckles started turning white from the tight hold on the knife.

"Are you done with that?" Mikey asked and pointed to the knife in Raph's hand, completely oblivious to the deadly look coming his way.

All of this led to the same question the old rat had been worrying over since he first woke up. He couldn't hold it in anymore.

"How was morning practise?"

Leo happily opened his mouth, having waited for the permission to tell on Michelangelo since they seated. "Mikey handled it, and I don't wanna be a tittle-tale or anything, but I feel I should tell you that he went too far."

"That's the understatement of the year," Don added, while filling up his cup with more coffee.

"Oh?" Splinter's ears rose up on his head, and he put his tea cup down. He turned to his youngest son, sitting next to Donatello. "Is this true, Michelangelo?"

"Oh, c'mon guys," Mikey nervously looked at his brothers, while trying to laugh it off. "It wasn't that bad."

"Not that bad!" Raph outburst, knocking over his glass in the process, and spilling milk over the table. "You had us listening ta 'Titanic' during mediation!"

"Well, it's suppose to be relaxing," Mikey said, defending his choice of music.

"Oh yeah?" Raph questioned. "So what about that last track we listened to? I'm pretty sure that's the one they used when the ship went unda' and everyone ran around in panic."

"Yeah, that wasn't very relaxing, Mikey," Leo added from Raph's left, where he tried to save his sandwich from the growing puddle of milk.

"What?" Mikey innocently defended himself. "You didn't wanna listen to 'Free Willy', so what was I supposed to do?"

"I still can't believe you even _have_ that soundtrack," Don said, shaking his head in disbelief.

"Enough," Splinter ordered, causing his sons to fall silent. He then turned to his orange masked student. "Michelangelo, I hope you did not choose this task only so you can act cruel towards your brothers."

"Course not," Mike replied.

"Then I assume you will take tomorrow's lesson more serious. Power is not something you should take advantage of. It is there to keep order."

"Yes, sensei," Mikey nodded.

"Good," Splinter said and picked up his cup of tea. "Now let us enjoy the rest of this meal in peace."

The four housekeepers nodded and returned to their food, all but Raphael who got up to get the dishcloth. Splinter took a sip from his cup and looked at the fridge, where his list had been put up. He would have to take a closer look at that thing later. Who knew what _else_ Michelangelo had chosen? For instance, he did not want that man to buy his food. After all, one can only survive on pizza for so long.

* * *

Michelangelo hurried towards the bathroom sub-car, stopping dead in his tracks when spotting his older brother hanging over the bathtub, his big, green ass blinding him.

"Raph?" Mikey cautiously asked. "You're not barfing are you? Cuz if you are, ya should probably move your business to the potty."

"Or..." Raph growled, turning his head over his shoulder to be able to look at his brother. "I could just shove this sponge down yer throat! Get outta 'ere!" With that, he bent back down, and continued to scrub the tub.

"_You_ get outta here," Mikey countered, stepping inside the sub-car. "I have a certain number one that needs to be taken care of."

Raph was still scrubbing. "Do I look like a person who cares?" he asked, his irritation showing in his forceful scrubbing.

"But Ra-aph," Michelangelo whined, frantically stepping on the spot, pretending he was about to wet himself. "I can't go with you here.."

"Ye betta' not!" Raphael threatened, dipping the sponge in the water bucket to his left. "Go botha' someone else." He wringed the sponge with his hands, grimacing at the sight of the not-so-clean water pressing out between his fingers, knowing perfectly well where it came from. He then turned back to the filthy tub, scrubbing the dirt right off.

Mike halted in the middle of his little tapdance number. "They're all busy," he said, and walked up to the sink.

"Yeah well so I am. Now scram it!" Raph paused the scrubbing for a second, only to rest his cramping arm against the edge of the tub. "Sides, isn't that Leo on the couch out there?"

"Sure is," Mike confirmed, while admiring his reflection in the bathroom mirror. "But he's watchin' that 'Band of brothers' flick." He then turned to face Raph. "Do ya have _any_ idea how long that thing is?"

"So go botha' Donnie, then," Raphael nonchalantly suggested, scrubbing himself tired.

"No can do," Mikey replied, turning back to the mirror. "He's sleeping." He then spotted the toothpaste on the sink, and a wicked smile curved his lips. He unscrewed the cork and squeezed out a tiny lump on his finger.

"So botha' someone else!" Raph snapped. "Mike, I don't care _whattahel__l_ ya do, juz get outta my way!"

"But I really have to go," Mikey complained, screwing the cork back onto the toothpaste and putting it back down by the soap. "In fact, I think I feel a number two coming up."

"Mike," Raph said calmly, taking a break from scrubbing, although his back was still turned to his brother. "I'm two seconds away from shoving this bucket ova' yer head. So if ya don't happen ta like brown water..."

"Only because you said that, I'm gonna save up a chunk _so_ big you'll hafta unclog the crapper."

Raph immediately turned around, the bucket ready in his hands, and the look in his eyes was everything but friendly. Mikey knew when to make an exit, and used his ninja speed to run for his life. He had locked himself inside his room on two seconds flat, and Raphael was left alone to do the rest of his cleaning.

After he was done, he rose to his feat, his back cracking from having bent over for so long. Raph took the bucket and poured the unsanitary water down the toilet. After flushing, he went over to the sink to wash his hands, partly for his peace of mind. As he stood there, his hands rubbed in soap, he noticed the little message his brother had left on the mirror - finger-painted in toothpaste.

_You just wait until ya hafta scrub the toilet. You never know what y'might find there._


	4. One can not be the best at everything

**Chapter 4 - "One can not be the best at everything."**

Michelangelo cheerfully strutted around the lair, a watering can held in his grip, while at the same time singing 'My heart will go on' to anyone who would listen. Sadly, he didn't know the lyrics all to well, so he made up for the words he couldn't remember, replacing them with whatever word or sound that rhymed even the tiniest.

_"Far across the distance, and spaceships between us, you have come to show you move on,"_ Mike sang, while waltzing up to the fern by the stairs.

Leonardo, positioned on the couch with a sai in his hands, tried to block his little brother out, at least enough to be able to watch the movie. It was more than obvious that Mikey was getting to him, since he polished the steel so intensely that it almost burned him. But, wanting to live up to his rumor, Leo swallowed hard to maintain his patience.

Raph, also present in the room, sat on the floor by the TV, surrounded in DVD's, videotapes and video game cases. He had gotten the fancy job of putting everything where it belonged, meaning; he had the honors to rewind all their tapes and put them in their right cases. Since Mike was the one who used these things the most, none of them were where they were supposed to be. And the fact that the same person danced around the living room didn't make Raphael like him much more. He wanted more than anything to shove one of the tapes down Mike's throat, but he had decided not to let him bother him anymore. After all, that was what Mikey wanted - attention.

Mike tipped the can over the plant, lifting up his leg behind him while watering it, pretending he was one of those angel statues. After all, he was kind of like an angel, a very green, pizza craving angel... but at least he was naked. While holding his artistic pose, he never forgot to sing, being the most important job when you were a naked angel.

_"Near far, wherever you are, I believe that the heart does go on. Once more... nah nah on the floor--"_

"Could ye for _once_ juz shaddup!" Raph yelled, not being able to ignore the singing and dancing any longer.

Mike jumped at the sudden voice, spilling some water onto the bottom steps, before he turned around to see what the problem was.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" Raph asked, putting one of Mike's 'Jackass' tapes to the side.

"I'm singing," Mike answered, as-a-matter-of-factely.

"Yeah? Well a little word of advice, Celine. Move yer concert elsewhere - or this'll be yer last one," Raph scolded, picking up another unlabeled videotape for inspection.

"But I'm already done with Splinter's room," Mikey explained.

"So then stop singing," Leo joined the conversation. "God, you can't even get the words right.. There is _nothing_ in that song about any floors. And.. 'spaceships between us'? Think a little!" Leo felt his tense body relaxing slightly, after finally letting the truth out in the open.

"So _what_ if I don't know the words." Mikey shrugged his shoulders. "It's not like anyone does." He then walked up to Leo, stopping a few feet behind the couch. "And about that, why _is it_ that you know 'em?"

Leo buried his face in his hands, searching deep inside himself for that extra strength you stored for emergency situations only.

"You're still upset about this morning," Mike realized, nodding his head in understanding, "aren't ya?"

"Of course I am!" Leo exclaimed, looking up at his brother. "But that's not what this is about, Mikey."

Michelangelo thought to himself for a moment, before looking back to Leonardo; puzzled. "Then what is it?"

Leo grunted in frustration, looking up at the ceiling for any kind of help he might find.

"Mike," Raph said, looking up from the floor. "Yer prancin' aroun' the living room like some sugar high fruit - whattahell do ya _think_ it's about?"

"Chill out, Raph," Michelangelo said, holding up his hands and watering can in defence. "It's not like I'm hurting anyone."

"That's funny," Raph said sarcastically. "Cuz I could think of at least two people in pain."

"Okay, okay I get it - no more singing. Geez, I was only doing my chores," Mike said, before turning to Leo. "Speaking of chores, when are ya planning on serving lunch, Leo? I'm starving."

Leonardo turned to look at Mikey, irritation playing on his features. "Can't you see I'm busy?"

Mikey glanced at the TV, where 'Band of brothers' still took place. "Y'know ya could just pause and watch it later."

Leonardo frantically motioned to the weapons lying on the couch, some of them polished, and some of them not.

"Oh," Mike realized. "Well... so take a break. It's not like they're going anywhere."

"Replacing one chore with another is not a break," Leo slowly pointed out.

"True," Mike agreed. "But at least you'll get to eat when lunch is done," he added, thinking it was the smartest thing in the world.

"You mean, _you_ get to eat," Leonardo corrected.

"You.. me.. What's the difference?" Mikey shrugged. "We could all go for some food."

"Fine," Leo surrendered, shoving the pile of weapons to the side and rising to his feet. "But only to get you off my back." He pointed accusingly at Michelangelo, who just smiled happily. With that, Leonardo turned off the movie and stomped into the kitchen, leaving his other two brothers alone in the living room.

"Y'know we'll getcha' for this, right?" Raphael spoke from the floor, not even looking up from the mess.

Michelangelo quietly swallowed the lump in his throat, knowing from experience to take Raph's threats seriously. Even though he would forever look back to his morning practise with a grin on his face, he began wondering if it was really worth it.

* * *

Leo walked up to the fridge, where Splinter had put this week's for-lunch-and-dinner schedule. He read that today's lunch was potatoes and fried hotdogs.

_That shouldn't be so hard_, he thought positively to himself.

He then searched the almost empty fridge for the supplies he would need. After placing the hotdogs, potatoes, and the margarine on the counter, Leo opened one of the bottom cabinets for a frying pan and saucepan. He then dropped the potatoes into the sink, where he began peeling them, and being a perfectionist of the worst kind, the job sure took its sweet time. But after he was finished, the naked potatoes didn't have the smallest trace of peels left on them.

Leo smiled proudly to himself, admiring his perfectly peeled potatoes. He then walked up to the stove and dropped the potatoes into the boiling water, one by one, causing some hot water to splash up on his arm.

"Ow!" Leo cried in pain, grabbing his right lower arm. He inspected the wound and found a small piece of burned skin. Biting his cheek, Leo walked up to the sink and cooled off his injured arm under the tap. He relaxed once the cold water started having its effect, and soon decided he was chipper enough to continue with his task.

He then washed the turner spatula under hot water, removing last night's dinner. When he decided it was clean enough, he used his choice of weapon to cut off a slim piece off of the margarine. He tossed the sliver into the frying pan, and it started frizzling immediately, indicating there was enough heat to fry the hotdogs. Leo grabbed a slimy sausage and placed it carefully in the pan, repeating the procedure several times, until he felt brave enough to toss a hotdog. The second the food landed in the frying pan, the margarine made a sizzling sound and shot a squirt of steaming butter onto his face.

"Nghh!" Leo hissed and grabbed onto his sore cheek, tentatively caressing it while walking towards the sink again. He quickly turned on the water and lowered his head to the sink, only to have hot water shower his face, from when he washed the turner spatula.

"Aah!" he shrieked, stumbling backwards in shock. He then got a grip of himself and turned off the water, deciding his face could survive with another wound to the collection. Just then Leo smelled something unsettling. Once realizing what it was, he ran up to the stove and turned over the hotdogs, only do discover their much, much darker side.

His frown grew tremendously, not being used to failing at anything. He was always the one who mastered the latest trick Splinter taught them, or aced the five page long test they had to write. And of all the things he could've failed at, who knew cooking would be it?

* * *

There was a strange silence at the table, no one feeling brave enough to comment on the half black, half red hotdogs. Instead, everyone focused on their own plate, eating in silence. The maddening sound of the knives cutting into the porcelain was the only thing audible, and unless someone said something soon, it would drive them all insane.

Michelangelo slid his fork into the crumbly potato, witnessing it falling apart like a crappy built sandcastle on a hot summer day. He spotted Donatello smiling in the corner of his right eye, and turned to return the favor.

"Why not just come out and say it?" Leonardo outburst, putting down his fork to the table.

The three brothers shared worried glances with each other, no one wanting to volunteer to take the first hit.

"I. Can't. Cook," Leo announced dramatically. "Okay, so I'm not always perfect, but that's no reason to laugh behind my back."

"One can not be the best at everything, my son," Splinter comforted, turning to look at his oldest son, sitting to his right.

"Y'know, there's a difference at not always bein' the best and sucking beyon' all limits," Raph sniggered to Leo's right, not being able to hold it in any longer.

"Raphael," Splinter scolded. "Once you have finished eating your lunch, you will perform ten flips."

Raph nodded at his sensei before turning back to his plate, angrily sticking his fork through the crispy surface of the black hotdog.

Splinter turned back his attention to Leonardo, who's broken spirit stared obsessively at his plate. "You should all know only practise makes perfect," he said, glancing at Michelangelo.

Mikey took the hint about his this morning's slavery, and lowered his eyes from his master's gaze.

"I'd rather not wait that long," Leo mumbled. "Can't someone else do lunch, and I'll take their chore?" Leonardo glanced around the table.

"It is entirely up to you," Splinter said, having decided to stay out of this as much as possible. "However, I advise you to stick with what you first chose. One of the hardest lessons in life is to learn to never give up, even when the road is difficult."

"I agree," Leo nodded at his master. "But perhaps things would work better if everyone did what they knew."

"Wait a minute?" Donatello spoke up, squinting his eyes at the blue masked turtle. "You wanna switch with one of us?"

"I just thought that since me serving lunch was kind of a disaster, and Mikey's morning practise could've gone better--"

"Whow, hold it there, dude," Michelangelo interrupted. "I'm not switching with anyone."

"I know you don't want to, Mike," Leo said, calmly. "But honestly--"

"No," Mikey exclaimed. "I'm not switching. Is _that_ what this is all about? You wanting to take over morning practise?"

"Of course not," Leo said, while trying to keep his voice down. "I just think it would make things a little easier for all of us. Don't you?"

"No," Mike replied instantly.

Donatello and Raphael watched the conversation with great interest, liking the direction where it headed. Leo taking over their training meant; no more being whipped around. And the fact that they could avoid Mikey's mediation session with dolphins screaming in the background, well that pretty much made up for the tacky lunch they were forced to eat.

"C'mon, Mikey," Leo smiled slightly. "You know as well as I do, we would all be a lot better off in a world without my food and your terrorism."

"I don't care _how_ gross your food is," Mike persisted. "I'm not switching."

"Well..." Leo thought to himself for a moment. "What if we vote about it?"

Donnie and Raph lit up like a couple of kids on Christmas morning, enjoying every syllable of Leo's last sentence. All but Mikey turned to look at the resident decision maker.

"I would rather have you solve this on your own," Splinter said, noticing Michelangelo sulking at the other end of the table.

"But voting is still us solving it by ourselves, isn't it?" Don questioned, staring at his master with hope gleaming in his eyes.

Splinter turned to look at his other two sons, who even they held a scary resemblance to puppy dogs. "I suppose it is," he surrendered.

"Fine," Leo spoke up. "Then all who's for Mike serving lunch and me leading morning practise," he rose his right arm in the air, Don and Raph quickly following his example.

Mikey only crossed his arms in protest.

"Okay, so that's that." Leo smiled. "I guess that means you're cooking tomorrow, Mikey."

"This is so unfair," Michelangelo objected. "I didn't get to say anything."

"Well, you sort of didn't have to, Mikey," Donnie pointed out. "The voting pretty much said it all." The three voters smiled happily at each other, knowing they never had to live through this morning's night mare again.

"Oh, you are _so_ gonna regret dumping me for Leo," Mike told them. "One session with _this_ dude," he pointed to Leo across from him, "and you'll come craaawling back to me."

"We'll see about that, Mikey," Leo said smugly, before returning to his food, knowing he never had to eat anything as disgusting again.

* * *

After having cleaned up in the kitchen and done the dishes, Leo plopped down on the couch to pick up where he left off. He polished Raphael's other sai while enjoying the company of 'Band of brothers.'

For the first time in a very long time, he felt his life was finally running on the right track. He would no longer suffer from his younger brother's sadistic behaviour in the dojo, nor cook another meal ever again, well.. unless it was a matter of life and death, _or_ if he was really hungry, but other than that - never again. Instead he could just sit here and watch the movie he had longed to watch for months, and there wasn't a thing in the world that could take that away from him.

Just then, Leo's peaceful moment was interrupted by loud snoring coming from the other end of the couch.

Leo turned to find a curled up Donatello there, his head resting on his arm. Leo nudged him carefully with his left foot, without any signs of life coming from the turtle. So he poked a little harder - still no response. Finally, Leo practically kicked Don in his ass, only resulting in the snoring reptile to stir slightly.

"Donnie?" Leo questioned, but as several seconds passed without an answer, or any signs implying that he'd even heard him, Leo decided to leave his brother alone and return to the movie.

A war took place in a European forest, that was completely covered in white snow, and the extras died like flies trapped in glass jar. And through all this, the only thing he could hear was Donatello snoring. And as another ten seconds of wheezing and choking passed, Leo couldn't take it anymore.

"Don!" He threw the remote control square in his sleeping brother's face.

"Wha..? What is it?" Donnie woke up with a start.

"You're snoring so loud I can't even hear the movie," Leonardo informed.

"So you threw the remote at me?" Don asked upset, the object held in his hand.

"I tried everything else and you didn't wake up," Leo explained. "Are you okay? Maybe you should head to bed."

"I slept all the way to lunch," Don replied, and reached out to place the remote control on the coffee table.

"So maybe you should sleep some more," Leo suggested, "in your bed," he added after Donatello started making himself comfortable on the couch again.

"Fine." Donnie sat up and yawned, stretching his arms to get his blood circulation kicking again. He got up and walked tiredly towards his room, only to be interrupted halfway there.

"Oh, and I almost forgot," Leo began. "I filled the trash when I cleaned up after lunch, so you should probably empty them before the flies settle."

Don's shoulders slumped five inches below their usual position, as he was forced to change his direction to the kitchen sub-car, instead of his warm bed. He dragged his heavy feet over to one of the bottom cabinets.

As he opened the cabinet door a gazillion potato peels washed over his feet.

Don bent forward with a grunt to put the icky leftovers back in the trash bin. Then, after being forced to shove his entire arm down the pile of various garbage, to keep the peels from attacking him again, Donnie lifted the bag and closed the cabinet.

He then left the kitchen and walked towards the stairs leading up to the exit ladder. But as he climbed the bottom step, he slipped on the water Mikey spilled earlier when he was watering the plants, and Don fell hard on his shell. Most of the garbage in the bag spread across the concrete floor.

"Are you all right?" Leo asked from the couch, smothering a smile that threatened to break out at any moment. The image was just too funny; Don lying on the floor in the middle of a huge pile of potato peels.

"I'm fine," Donnie mumbled, when getting back up on his two feet. He then spent the following minutes of his life picking up and shoving down potato peels down the garbage bag, and this time he made sure to tie it together properly to keep it from happening again.

After discovering a bruise on his left thigh and eventually climbing the exit ladder, the sleepwalking turtle began his long journey through the smelly sewers to the city dump.


	5. What kind of suggestion?

**Chapter 5 - "What kind of suggestion?"**

A relieved turtle put down the final nunchuck in the pile of cleaned and polished weapons to his right. It had been a tough couple of hours, where he several times wrestled with the thought of skipping the nunchucks, just to teach his little brother some sort of lesson. But he couldn't live with the thought of not doing his very best, so he ended up cleaning them anyway. He leaned back in the couch with a tired sigh, a small smile stretching his mouth, until his was grinning madly.

"What's up with the creepy face?" Raphael asked from the floor by the VCR, where he rewind another tape.

Leo glared at his brother, his smile vanishing instantly. "I'm happy," he said, in a manner that pointed to the complete opposite of happiness.

"Yeah?" Raph questioned with a raised eye ridge. "Well ye don't sound very convincin' about it."

"That's because you're pissing me off," Leo pointed out, before rising from the couch and walking up to the DVD, placed upon the television set. He pressed eject and watched as one of the 'Band of brothers' discs appeared. He carefully lifted it between his thumb and index finger, replacing it with another disc from the super-sized 'Band of brothers' box.

"Oh, ya _betta'_ put that back in the case," Raph threatened, when obsessively watching his brother switch the discs.

"Oh, relax Raph," Leo shushed his suddenly tidy brother, when pressing play. "I'm not Mikey." He watched as the menu appeared on the screen, while walking backwards towards the couch with the remote in his grip.

"Well that's juz damn lucky fer you, cuz iffa see 'im near these movies again - he's history." Raphael rose to his feet with the final DVD case in his hand - 'Coneheads.' He slid it in between the other DVD's in the bookcase, not caring if it didn't fit, but just pushed extra hard, till the flick blended together with the others he had been sorting out all day.

"Whatcha' watchin', Leo?"

Raphael spun around to find his youngest brother come out of the bathroom, walking up to the back of the couch.

"Band of brothers," Leonardo mumbled, while setting the proper picture size.

"So what number are ya on?" Mikey asked, leaning forward on the back of the couch.

"If you mean episode, it's number five," Leo said, while folding together the package of DVD's and putting it back in the box. "But if it's which disc, I just put in the third."

"So..." Mike trailed, "how many discs are there?"

"Six," Leo answered, while removing their weapons from the couch and putting them on the coffee table. "But don't worry, I can update youon what's happened," he quickly added, excited about someone other than himself seeming interested in the series.

"Yeaaaah... okay, I'm gonna go," Michelangelo said, pointing towards his own room, to avoid being dragged down the horrible swamp of never ending war movies.

Leo then turned his optimistic eyes towards Raphael, who instantly realized what his brother wanted. "Forget it," he refused. "Sides, it's up ta me ta put dinner on the table," he remembered and fled for the kitchen.

"You two just don't know how to appreciate a good movie!" Leo called after his siblings, who chose to act like they didn't hear him. Leo shook his head in disapproval before returning to the film.

In the kitchen Raphael stood by the fridge to see what he was doomed to cook.

"Pasta and broccoli with tomato sauce?" He read to himself, liking his task less and less the further into the sentence he read. "Hell no."

* * *

Donatello placed his empty plate in the sink, ignoring the signals his roaming stomach sent out to him. "I'm gonna go to bed," he told the others, still seated at the table and eating their food.

"I understand." Splinter nodded at his student. "Sleep well, my son."

"You too, master," Donnie said, turning around to face his family. "G'night everyone." With that, Don left the kitchen for his dearly missed bed.

"He's turning in at eight thirty?" Raphael turned to the others, a pasta string hanging out of his mouth. "That's early even for a geek."

"You mustn't forget that your brother wakes up an hour earlier than yourself," Splinter reminded and grabbed his nearly empty glass of milk.

"Yeah," Mikey jumped in. "Or maybe he didn't get enough food to be able to stay awake." He glanced at Raphael, with a mocking smile playing on his lips.

"Maybe that's cuz you ate it all," Raph shot back, glaring at his brother from across the table.

"Or maybe it's cuz ya only made pasta," Mike countered. "I mean, I like Italy and everything, especially that Michelangelo dude. But no one can eat themselves full on just pasta." He pointed to his already empty plate.

"S'cuse me, Your Bottomless," Raph hissed, "but I didn't wanna pull a Leo." He hastily pointed to the blue masked turtle next to him, who tiredly rolled his eyes, knowing he would be taunted for that in years to come. "So I figured that instead of _ruining_ dinna', I would juz play my cards safe."

"What, and not make any?" Mikey questioned, putting his fork down on his empty plate, while staring expectantly at Raphael.

"You should be glad ye got any dinner," Raph hissed, before returning to his spaghetti plate. "It's not like ya earned it."

"Since when do we have to earn food?" Michelangelo wondered, looking at Leo for support.

"Since I started makin' it," Raph replied with his fork in his mouth, not even looking up from his plate.

Leonardo shrugged his shoulders at Mikey before he went back to his food, and Mike, who could sense when a conversation was over, got up to put his dishes in the sink. Splinter mused silently to himself, his smile hidden behind his glass of milk, as things seemed to be going just like he had imagined it.

At least when he ran the household, he didn't have to argue with other people about who did what, and how well they did it.

* * *

Dinner had passed, and Raphael was left to clean up in the kitchen. He instantly noticed that in the competition of who held the most resemblance to a pig, Mike's greasy manners had won by far. The only clean space at his place at the table, was the part where his plate had been placed. Splinter and Leonardo were of course spotless, while Donnie only had a milk ring from his glass. Then, there was Raph himself, but since he was the one cleaning it up, he figured he wasn't in the competition.

After filling the sink with water, and using _way_ too much washing-up liquid, he began scrubbing the evenings dishes clean, while muttering a censored word here and there.

"Evenin', Mrs. Potts," Mike greeted happily as he waltzed into the kitchen. "How's it going?"

Raph froze at the cheery voice and gritted his teeth, before diving back into the nasty water with his itchy hands. "Would be a lot betta' it you weren't here," he calmly replied to his baby brother.

"Yeah, ya don't have to be a ninja to sense the tension in the air," Mikey said, stopping by the table. "Anyway, I only came to see if ya know where Leo's hiding? It's time for the Green Angels of the Night to go to work."

"Makin' up stupid names ain't gonna make patrollin' with Leo any less boring," Raph harshly pointed out, putting another clean plate to the side.

"Yeah, well _someone_ has to keep the relationship alive, and Teacher's Pet isn't very hot on the romance front." Michelangelo giggled at his joke.

"Would ye _stop_ shoving images into my mind," Raph snapped, holding an innocent glass under water longer than necessary. "What I'm doin' is gross enough!"

"Sorry," Mikey apologized, flatly. "So do ya know where he is?"

"He's in Splinter's room," Raphael revealed, finally allowing the poor glass to come up to the surface. "Probably askin' for pointers for tomorrah's practice."

"That cheating son of a bitch," Mike cursed, his good mood suddenly gone, when being reminded of his chore switch with his oldest brother. With that, Mike turned on his heel to fetch his partner in patrol, mainly to keep him from getting any more tips from Splinter.

Of course, Raph didn't mind, seeing as he was finally left alone with his disgusting chores.

* * *

The two turtles stopped at the edge of a rooftop, the tallest spying down over the city with determination in his eyes. The smaller one that stood next to him seemed to have no interest in the city whatsoever, but kept his glare on the other one, his eyes burning a hole through the green skin of his older brother's face.

Leonardo casually turned his head to the side and noticed the deadly stare Mike gave him. "Oh, would you give it a rest, Mikey!" he exclaimed, his frustration getting the better of him, although quiet enough not to draw unwanted attention. "I did _not_ ask master Splinter for any pointers!"

"Oh yeah?" Mike retorted. "Then how come you got all quiet when I came in?" He gazed suspiciously at the blue masked turtle, as if he was a suspect in interrogation.

"Because you gave me that same look," Leo half explained, half defended himself.

"Oh, I'm onto you, Leo," Mikey whispered, angrily. "You're not getting away with this."

"Look," Leo sighed and closed his eyes, before giving his brother his full attention. "I get it that you're mad at me for taking over morning practice--"

"You bet I am!" Michelangelo interrupted.

"_But_ we still have a job to do," Leo continued. "And it would be a lot easier if you kept your eyes on the city instead of me." He stared expectantly at Mikey, waiting for him to answer.

"Fine," Mike agreed after a moment of thinking. "But only for the safety of New York."

"Of course," Leo agreed flatly, before turning his shell and running off to the next rooftop. "So let's go."

Michelangelo quickly caught up to his big brother, angrily glaring at him every now and then, when Leo was too concentrated to notice.

Throughout the night Leo thought tiredly to himself, _And me who thought Raph and Donnie would be the one having problems._

* * *

Raphael shared a much too quiet night in front of the TV with master Splinter, watching another dramatic episode of 'ER', that the old rodent necessarily had to see. Most of the lair was dark, apart from the light that came off the TV, and Raph sank deeper and deeper into the couch, his spirit fighting to survive the boredom. Splinter sat in his old chair, nervously scratching at the armrest when another patient's heart gave in on the operation table.

Raph had never though he would miss his brothers, and kept reminding himself to enjoy the silence while it lasted, but watching 'ER' with his father wasn't quite the same as hanging out with his very loud and very annoying brothers.

A few minutes later, as the patient had died, and two more doctors had hooked up together, Splinter turned in his chair. "Ridiculous that they have us wait another week for the next episode," the rat smiled tiredly at his son, who nodded in response, even if it only was to keep his dear old dad happy. "I think I will retire for the night," Splinter concluded and rose from his chair, grabbing the cane that rested beside it. "Goodnight, my son. Do not forget to turn off the television."

"Sure," Raphael answered, instantly switching to another channel. "Night, Splinter."

Then as his father had retreated to his own sub-car, and Raph had flicked through the dozens of channels one too many times, he finally turned off the TV and got up from his deformed position on the couch. He stood in the silent living room for a few seconds, contemplating oncopying his father and go to bed, when he suddenly thought of something else.

Raph set his course towards Donatello's sub-car, pulling the doors open without so much as bothering to even _consider_ knocking first.

Donnie woke up from the sudden sound of the doors sliding open, and stirred tiredly in the darkness. "Who's there?" he mumbled into his shoulder.

"Don," Raph called out in the darkened room, stumbling over gadgets when trying to find his way towards to mattress in the left corner. "Donnie, get up. I hafta talk ta ya."

"Ra-aph..." Donatello complained, rolling over in bed to ignore the rude intrusion. "Go away. I'm sleeping."

But Raphael wasn't planning on leaving, and continued his bumpy path towards the bed, tripping over Don's ridiculously big toolbox that stood in the middle of the floor, as if it had been put there just so someone would crash violently to the ground.

The loud noise of someone heavy hitting the floor, followed by Raph's cursing and hissing, caused Don to wake up in a flat second. He quickly sat up and reached for the lamp above his bed, finally introducing his pitch black room to some light.

"What're you doing?" Donnie hysterically exclaimed, when spotting his clumsy brother lying in a heap of gadgets and tools. "You're breaking all my stuff!"

Raph angrily staggered to his feet, caressing his bruised butt. "Thanks fer yer concern, Don," he muttered, while moving aside to allow his freaked out brother to inspect his inventions. "Maybe if ya didn't hafta store yer crap on the floor, I wouldn't have had ta trip over it." He carefully stepped over the tools to sit his injured ass on the mattress.

"Well, lucky for you that nothing got hurt," Donatello spoke up from the floor, tinkering with a speaker to his soon to be stereo.

"In case ya didn't notice, someone _did_ get hurt," Raph bitterly pointed out from the bed, his green behindgetting a little too green.

Donnie only ignored his brother's whining and began putting the tools back in the box. "What're you doing in here anyway?" he asked, while picking stuff up from the floor.

"I came with a proposal," Raph declared, deciding to leave his butt be. "I might've come up with a way ta get back on Mike."

Don froze in his cleaning, a hammer in his hand. "What d'ya mean?" he curiously turned to look at Raphael.

"Course, Leo has ta agree to it," Raph admitted. "But somehow I don't think that'll be a problem this time."

Don put down the hammer in the box before turning his full attention to his evil sibling. "What are you saying?"

Raph smiled when he realized he had gotten himself an ally. "I'm sayin' that tomorrah on mornin' practice, it's time for _Mikey_ to put in a little extra."

"As in, make him pay?" Don inquired, his eyes gleaming with foreign anticipation.

"Exactly," Raphael confirmed with a grin. "Anyway, we'll need Leo's approval, but he ain't home yet."

Donnie rose from the floor with the toolbox in his hands, putting it away on his desk before turning back to Raph. "So we'll just wait for him to get back," he simply said, leaning his shell against the desk.

"I thought ye wanted ta sleep?" Raph asked with a sly smile.

"Naah, I can sacrifice a couple of hours," Donnie waved off his brother's comment. "After all, it's for a good cause."

"Yeah," Raphael agreed sadistically. "Splinter's always talkin' 'bout the Greater Good." The two party-planners shared a moment of evil laughter, thinking about the many ways to get back on their little brother.

* * *

Leonardo jumped down the final steps of their entrance ladder, glancing up at Mike who came climbing down right after him. It had been a tough night, and not in the sense that the criminals had been many, but more like in the Mike's-a-pain-in-the-ass kind of tough.Mikey had been eye-balling him the entire night, even though Leo had pretended he didn't notice, and that had slowly sucked him dry on his trademark patience. Now he only wanted to go to bed, and the fact that the lair was dark and quiet would make sleeping a whole lot easier, since Leo mightneed the extra help with going to sleep, with all the anger boiling withun him.

He descended the platform stairway and headed off towards the bathroom to brush his teeth, his brother's footsteps echoing behind him.

Michelangelo left for the kitchen without whispering the smallest word of goodnight to his brother, and got slightly surprised at how clean everything was after Raphael had done his part of the household. Not that it hadn't been cleaned when Leo or Don cleaned up earlier today, but still, coming from Raph that was quite a surprise.

Mike walked up to one of the cupboards and brought out the bag of cat food. Klunk immediately recognized the noise and came running from Mikey's room, where he had probably been napping. The cat stroke itself against Mike's legs, causing the angry turtle to melt a little.

"How'my s'pose to stay mad when your all cute and friendly?" he asked the non-speaking cat, and bent down to pet him, striking his hand across the furry back.

Mikey then filled the bowl that stood in the corner of the counter, and moved out of the way as the cat jumped up to eat. Mike couldn't help himself from snatching a cereal, even though he knew from experience that it tasted like crap, and filled up Klunk's other bowl with clean, fresh water. He put the water next to the bowl of cat-snacks and stoke his pet one final time across the back, before turning off the lights and leaving to brush his teeth.

* * *

Leonardo felt himself drifting off to much welcomed sleep, after having spent several minutes on cursing his annoying little brother. And just as peace washed over him, a knock on his door brought him right back to reality.

Leo opened his eyes and sat up in bed, staring at the door to his sub-car. "What?" he asked, hoping it wasn't Michelangelo coming to accuse him of cheating on his chores.

The doors slid open and two dark silhouettes entered. Leo reached for the lamp on his bedside table and hit the switch. "What're you guys doing here?" he asked, tiredly rubbing his eyes to get used to the light.

"We came with a suggestion," Donatello answered from the far end of the room, a strange smile creeping onto his face.

"What kind of suggestion?" Leo wondered, looking from one brother to the other.

"One ye don't wanna turn down," Raph said smugly, his grin three times wider than Donnie's.


	6. Don’t forget the secret ingredient

**Chapter 6 - "Don't forget the secret ingredient."**

It was in the early hours of Thursday morning, in the dark underground subway terminal, that suddenly didn't seem so abandoned anymore,where a one-turtle-concert took place. The performer in question happily strutted around in the kitchen sub-car, shaking his green ass as he filled up the coffee percolator with freshly crushed beans, while singing to himself, and anyone who was awake to listen, as if he didn't have a care in the world.

_"I can see cleeeeearly now the rain is gone. I can see aaaaaaall obstacles in my waay. Gone are the daaa-ark clouds that had me bliind. It's gonna be a briiight, bright, bright, bright sunshiny day. It's gonna be a briiight, bright, bright, bright sunshiny day."_ He turned on the coffee maker and waggled towards one of the cupboards in a samba looking manner. There, he picked out the cleanest porcelain they owned, and brought it with him to the kitchen table.

_"I think I can maake it now the pain is gone. All of the baaaad feelings have disappeeeared. Here is that rainbow I've been praying for. It's gonna be a briiight, bright, bright, bright sunshiny day."_ Donatello put down each plate on five different places at the table, all while swaying his hips to the cheery melody of his words.

There was no trace of the sleepwalking turtle that had prepared yesterday's breakfast, and perhaps it had something to do with today's morning session. Because this time Donnie _knew_ what he got himself into, and he knew for a fact that Stalin was retired, and revenge was scheduled.

_Could_ have something to do with it.

He danced over to the stove to start making the omelettes he had planned, a pure look of joy gleaming on his carefree face. It was indeed going to be a bright sunshiny day.

* * *

Splinter tiredly turned over on his mattress, trying to clear his mind of the noise coming from the carriage next to his. He couldn't understand why his son sang this early in the morning, nevertheless in the kitchen of all the places to perform. The shower would be understandable. Heck, he himself had even hummed a few tunes during his personal bathroom time, but never in the kitchen. And _never_ this early.

What struck him as odd was that Donatello was the one doing the singing. He wasn't exactly what one would call a morning person, and singing was his youngest son's department. It wasn't until now that the old ninja master understood why his inventing son hadn't shared his singing with them before, and probably did it while everyone else was sleeping - it sounded terrible. His voice reminded him of a screaming cat someone tried to strangle, especially on the high notes of the song.

Perhaps Donatello should stick to his books and projects, because this was torture to anyone who was cursed with the ability to hear.

Finally Splinter gave up on sleeping and got up for another early morning session of last-way-out meditation. Maybe he should bring out the heavy artillery and lit a couple of candles to help set the mood better, just in case.

* * *

Leonardo climbed down off the chair, and after talking a couple of steps back, inspected the clock hanging on the stone wall. He considered turning it forward five more minutes, but then decided to leave it at ten. The important thing was that it moved ahead of the other clocks in the lair, and that the youngest turtle didn't know of it.

"Countin' the minutes, are ya?"

Leo turned around to find his two brothers stepping onto the platform, where the light in the dojo could reach them.

"Yeah.." Raphael grinned. "I know the feelin'." He walked up to the old table that stood against the wall, in order to leave as much space as possible for training, and set down his portable CD player on it.

"Did you bring the music?" Leo questioned his partners in crime, walking up to them.

"Sure did," Don confirmed happily, and held up the 'Jaws' soundtrack to prove it.

"You turn the clock?" Raph returned a question, while plugging in the mini stereo.

"Yup, ten minutes ahead," Leonardo proudly announced. "So.. where _is_ Mikey?"

"I dunno..." Raph shrugged. "Sleepin', I guess." He bent down do adjust his knee pads.

"He didn't wake up with you two running around?" Leo wondered, slightly surprised.

"We're ninja," Don pointed out to his brother. "Remember?" He walked over to one of the shelves and grabbed the four plastic bottles that stood there. "Besides, I woke Raph up, so his clock wouldn't have to blare off."

"Good," Leo approved. "Then we should have some time to go over the plan."

"Like we could forget," Raph said with wicked smile.

"Sure," Don replied, and started walking towards the end of the platform. "I'll just fill up these bottles first."

"Don't forget the secret ingredient," Raphael reminded, his grin growing even bigger.

"I don't know, you guys," Leo spoke up from beside his brother in red. "Don't you think that's a little too much?"

"Aw, c'mon, Leo," Raph pushed, his eyes narrowing. "Don't bail on us. We talked about this last night."

"Yeah, I know." Leo nodded, looking in between his brothers. "But don't you think getting him drunk is a little over the edge?"

"Leo," Donnie said from across the room. "If there is such a thing as an 'edge', Mike sure pushed us _all_ over it yesterday."

"Yeah," Raph agreed with Donatello. "It's time ta push back."

"Splinter's gonna be furious," Leo said, staring into nothingness.

"So what's he gonna do?" Raph challenged, causing his oldest brother to look at him. "Take away our chores?"

Leo shrugged his shoulders.

"Y'know," Raph said, looking from Don to Leo. "Ye look more like a wuss than a fearless leader ta me. You should try livin' up ta yer name for once. See what it feels like."

Leo shot him an angry glare, showing his younger brother that he didn't find his joke very funny.

"C'mon, Leo," Raph said supportively, to make up for his insult. "It's karma."

The oldest turtle thought to himself for a while, wrestling with his two shoulder angels. One told him to abort the mission and forgive his little brother, while the other preached about how good it would feel once Mike got a taste of his own medicine. Finally, after having listened to the two miniatures of himself bicker with each other about who was right, Leo turned to his waiting siblings.

"All right," he said, nodding in agreement. "Let's do it."

Both Donatello and Raphael's faces lit up at the green sign, and Don turned and jumped off the platform.

"Wait," Raph stopped him. "Do ye even know where I keep the booze?"

Don thought to himself for a moment, realizing there was no right answer to that question. If he told Raph where it was, he would know that he had been snooping around in his room. But on the other hand, if he pretended like he didn't know, he turned down that part of himself that always had to be right, and always had to have all the answers.

"In your bottom drawer," he finally answered, giving into his ego, although with a worried look twisting his features.

"An' how is it ye know that?" Raph asked angrily, crossing his arms to intimidate his sibling even further.

"I might've been in your room.. once or twice," Donnie carefully admitted.

"You went through my stuff!" Raphael outburst, causing a scared sewer rat to come out of his hiding underneath the shelf and skitter across the floor. But as soon as the rat was gone, he turned his attention back to Donatello.

Don realized his siblings wasn't staring at the rat anymore and looked back at his red clad brother. "Only when I was looking for _mine_," he defended himself, his voice slightly higher than he had intended.

"Oh, like _when_ did I take any of yer stuff?" Raph shot back, ticked off by Don's answer.

Donnie's eye ridges shot up in shock, before he started rambling a long list of examples. "My laptop, my CD's, my comic books, my walkman, my board, my--"

Raph put up his hands to silent his brother, a little surprised he had such good memory. Even _he_ didn't remember taking all that stuff. "A'right, a'right, I get it. I borrow lot a' stuff."

"Funny you should use that word," Donnie said, lifting his right leg onto the platform. "Cuz in order to _'borrow'_ something, you have to give it back."

The two turtles glared at each other, each thinking the other one's mistake was more wrong.

"Maybe you should both go and get it," Leonardo suggested, causing both of them to look at him. "You'll probably need help carrying the bottles anyway." He pleadingly looked at his brothers, while feeling the minutes fly by like seconds.

"Okay," Donatello agreed, looking at Raphael. "I guess you could be of help."

"Fine," Raph said with a snobby look on his face. "We'll _both_ go." With that, the two enemies walked down the dark tunnel back to the living area, leaving Leonardo to the finishing touches of the soon to be training session.

* * *

The youngest turtle wandered down the tunnel to the dojo, surprised to hear fighting noises coming from there already. When he got there he saw Donatello and Raphael sparring with each other, and his third brother, Leonardo, supervising them by the sideline.

"You started without me?" Mikey questioned, with a hint of hurt on his voice.

Leo turned around to find the orange wearing turtle by the edge of the platform, watching his two siblings fight. "You're late," he strictly commented.

"Wha?" Mike breathed in surprise. "What are ya talking about, Leo? I'm totally on time."

"Oh really?" Leo questioned, his hands on his hips. "Then why don't you tell my what time it is?" He confidently motioned towards the clock on the wall.

Donnie and Raph took a pause in their fighting to witness their youngest brother fall victim to their evil plan.

"What?" Mikey exclaimed when looking at the clock. "But how can it be ten past already? I'm sure I left just before six. It couldn't've taken me ten minutes to get here." He absentmindedly scratched himself on his left elbow.

"Are you implying I'm lying?" Leo questioned, crossing his arms in disapproval.

"No.." Michelangelo answered, his gaze unsteady. "I'm just sayin' it's a little weird."

"Looks crystal clear to me," Leo said, holding his eyes on Mike. "Now run fifty laps around the dojo."

"Fifty laps?" Mikey repeated tiredly. "You're kidding. How 'bout I juz run down the tunnel and back?" He pointed down the tunnel behind him.

"Oh no," Leonardo forbid. "I want you _here_ where I can keep an eye on you."

Mike stood frozen, staring at his oldest brother in shock.

"Go on," Leo insisted. "You better get started if you want to make time for sparring."

Mikey's shoulders slumped in dismay as he slowly started running around the dojo.

Leo watched him with pleasure, holding back a smile to appear serious. "You two get back to practice," he ordered Don and Raph, who had watched the entire thing from the centre of the room.

* * *

Halfway through his fifty laps, Mike's tired legs dragged him over to the table where their water bottles stood. He reached for his bottle, where he had smudged his name in big capital letters, and unscrewed the cork. He hungrily brought the bottle to his lips and swallowed the cold liquid, only to twist his face in disgust and abort immediately. Mikey held the bottle in front of his face and looked at with confusion. It was definitely water. But the burning taste left in his throat told him there was something else as well in that bottle.

_No,_ Mikey thought to himself._ They couldn't possibly have... could they?_

"Something wrong?" Leo asked from where he stood, leaning his shell against the wall.

"I'm not sure," Mike replied, looking up at Leonardo. "There something wrong with my water?"

"Yeah, Raph and Donnie complained about their water tasting funny, too," Leo said, straightening himself. "Could be traces left of the polish I used to clean them with earlier. Don't worry, it's not toxic or anything."

Mikey suspiciously looked from his brother to his bottle, deciding whether to believe him or not. "Yeah, that's probably it," he finally said, and brought the bottle back to his lips and drank some more, even though that burning taste still lingered in his throat. He then screwed the cork back on and set off to finish his laps, unbeknownst to his brothers eyeing each other and grinning behind his back.

* * *

After having finished his laps, his flips, and moved on to sparring with Donatello, Michelangelo started to feel a bit dizzy. His eyes didn't quite follow his body, and it seemed as if his surroundings came afterwards, whenever he spun around. It didn't take long before Don had him pinned to the ground, his staff held horizontal against his plastron, to keep him from getting back up.

"Looks like you lost, buddy," Donnie said with a smile, before stepping off of him and offering his hand to help him up.

Mikey looked at him for a moment, before taking the hand and rising to his waggling feet. Don stared at him with a puzzled look, his eyes studying him intently.

"You okay there?" Donnie asked, trying to find eye contact with Mikey's swaying eyes.

"Yeah," Mike replied with a massive grin, even for him. "Juz punched the air outta me. I'll be fine." He chuckled, for no apparent reason.

Donatello nodded at his little brother, before looking over to Leo and Raph with an evil smile Mikey couldn't see.

"Alright," Leo spoke from the side of the room, where he and Raphael had been watching. "So let's move on to some basic exercises." He motioned for Raph to follow him over to the mat where the other two stood.

Mike groggily titled from one foot to the other, a broad smile playing on his face, that wouldn't go away.

* * *

By the time Leo had gathered them for meditation, Mikey couldn't stop giggling, and even seemed to have some trouble with sitting upright. The fact that the theme to 'Jaws' played in the background, the same movie that caused Michelangelo to wet his bed as is child, didn't seem to bother him the slightest. Instead, he happily sang along to the nightmarish melody, while making swimming motions with his arms, drunkenly pretending he was chased by the Great White.

Raphael rolled his eyes in irritation as Donnie smirked at the free entertainment they were given.

The part where the shark was about the attack, Mike started to wave around in panic, pretending he was drowning, and doing it impressively well, for a guy sitting on dry floor. And just to make sure that anyone who had ignored him before, wouldn't be able to, Mikey started screaming and rolling around on the mat, his legs kicking frantically.

"Okay, that's enough," Leonardo interrupted, after having observed his improvising little brother for minutes, being as the song was set on repeat.

Michelangelo froze in his worm like position on the floor, and lifted his head to look at the oldest turtle. "Duue, thissa' s'm aws'mm ssstuff," he complimented Leo for his choice of music. "I thaah ye'were gun' pick somet'n geeky, lie Beethov'n or some'n."

"Right," Leo replied, trying to hold his voice in control. "Sit up and behave yourself," he ordered. "This is a meditation session, not some break dance camp."

"If _that_'s break dancing," Donnie said, implying Mike's little performance. "Maybe you really _should _send him off to camp."

Raph snickered at the comment, ignoring the impatient glare his brother in blue sent him.

Mike just crawled over to his spot on the mat and sat back up, trying to post a serious look on his face. After double checking on the youngest, Leo closed his eyes along with the others and searched inside himself for inner peace.

A few minutes into the game, a loud thud brought them back to the room, and once their eyes were open, they quickly found the source of the sound.

Michelangelo laid sleeping on the floor, his cheek pressed up against the mat, with saliva running from the corner of his mouth, sticking his skin to the surface of the mat. Donnie knew for a fact that leaving him there for a few minutes, would only result in him to start snoring. Back when Donatello and Mikey had shared a room, he had to fall asleep to that wheezing sound coming from the mattress across from his. And Mike's snoring wasn't just like any kind of snoring. No, he brought the word to a _whole_ new level, where even the dead couldn't sleep in peace. This was one of the prime reasons for Don sleeping as hard as he did. Because when he finally got himself to fall asleep, he had to go _way_ under to keep the unbearable noise from waking him up.

"Great.." Leo muttered. The Fearless leader rose to his feet to turn off the music, and with that, end his first - and perhaps only - morning practice.

* * *

Raphael stood guard on the main platform, as Donatello snuck by with a laughing Michelangelo, who had also developed the famous drunken hiccup. He leaned his suddenly very heavy head on Don's left shoulder and didn't do much to move his legs, meaning Donnie had to support most of his brother's weight on his shoulder, by holding onto his right arm. They hurried inside Mikey's room, where Raph closed the doors together behind them, securing them from Splinter's eagle eye. Although just to be sure, he stayed in the living room, watching for any kind of danger.

Donnie dropped Mike onto his bed, causing a light chuckle to escape the drunken turtle's throat.

"I'mmot tired," Michelangelo slurred, trying to get back up.

"Sure you are," Don insisted, pushing him back down to his pillow. He then pulled out the covers from underneath him.

"Butta havven 'ad breakf'st yet," Mikey said, closing his eyes and nuzzling his face into his pillow.

"We'll save ya some for later," Don hastily promised, while burying his baby brother underneath his Spiderman covers.

"For sure.." Mike mumbled, already half asleep.

"Right. So you just sleep now..." Donnie said and backed away, carefully leaving the sub-car and closing the doors quietly after him, but not until hearing the beginning of Mike's abnormal snoring, of course.

"Fell asleep pretty fast," Raph spoke from the couch, mentioning to the snores coming from the closed room.

Donatello turned around and found Raphael with the TV remote in his hand, doing some early morning channel surfing. "Yeah," he confirmed. "Luckily." He then went over to sit down next to his brother, where they waited for Leo to finish in the shower. "Hey," he suddenly remembered something and turned to his brother. "What _was it_ in that liquor bottle of yours?"

Raph smiled evilly, recalling the time when he and Casey found out the hard way. "Yeah, it's pretty heavy stuff," he said, turning back to the TV. "But I didn't use much, which is why it's so good ta dilute with water. Ye can't taste it as strongly, like ya would with the usual stuff."

"Is that so?" Don questioned, an eye ridge halfway up his forehead.

Raphael turned to Donnie, noticing his intense stare. "What?" he exclaimed innocently. "It's not like he'll die or anythin'."

"Well, _you_ should know," Donatello mumbled, turning to look at the television.

* * *

It was unusually quiet at the table, the only sound coming from Splinter as he stirred the spoon in his cup of tea. Each turtle kept to himself, intensely focusing on his own plate of omelette. Splinter eyed all of them, watching how they ignored his gaze, before he opened his mouth to speak.

"Where is Michelangelo?"

The three turtle heads shot up at the mention of the youngest ninja's name, none of them seeming to know what to do.

"I put him in for a little extra work during practice," Leo answered from Splinter's right side. "You know, for what he did to us yesterday."

Splinter stared intently at his oldest son, waiting for him to proceed.

"Anyway," Leo continued. "It must've really wiped him out... cause he went straight to bed afterwards."

Splinter nodded in understanding, although sensing there was more to it than that. He decided he was better off not knowing, and lifted his warm cup to drink. "How _was_ practice?" he asked after he had swallowed the hot liquid, and turned to Donatello across the table.

"Good," Don replied stiffly, escaping his father's eyes by lifting some omelette onto his fork. "It was good. Um, we did some exercises and.. some meditating."

The old rat looked over to his red masked son, who sat to Leo's right. "Do you believe it was wise to vote for Leonardo?"

Raphael didn't realize Splinter was talking to him until he caught Donnie's urging look at the other side of the table. "Oh," he said, turning to his father. "Uhh.. yeah. Definitely."

* * *

Later in the day, far into the afternoon, Donatello sat in front of the TV, watching an old 'Fresh Prince' episode. Leonardo wiped the floors in the background, having already swept everywhere, well, except for Mikey's room, of course. Raphael came back from his emergency trip to the kitchen, and took his seat next to Donnie.

"We're outta milk," he told him casually.

"So put it on the fridge," Don answered absentmindedly.

"What?" Raph turned to look at his brother, confusion plastered on his face.

"Yeah," Don said, turning to his right where Raphael sat. "I put a note on the fridge, where you write down the things we need." He turned back to the TV.

"Ya mean, so _we_'ll do yer job," Raph corrected, slightly ticked off.

"You're not doing my job," Don disagreed, turning back to his brother. "It's just a system I came up with to make the process a little easier."

"For you," Raphael added.

"No.." Don insisted, his voice rising slightly. "For everyone. It's a perfectly good system. Saves us all a lot of time."

Leonardo quietly wiped away from behind them, listening to the argument, while doing his best to stay out of it.

"Yeah well, forget it," Raph refused. "I'm not doin' yer job. I have my _own_ chores ta deal with."

"You're not doing my job," Donnie said. "You're just helping out in the process."

"I don't care what ye call it," Raphael snapped. "I'm ain't part of no process."

"Raph, would you stop making such a big deal out of everything," Don argued. "It's not like _you_'re the one buying the food."

"I have to agree with Raph on this one," Leonardo spoke up from behind them, causing both of them to turn around in surprise. "You have to take full responsibility of your chores."

Raphael grinned victoriously at his older brother's support, flashing his smirk to Donatello, who only frowned in response. "Fine," he said, crossing his arms at his chest. "I'll keep that in mind next time you ask _me _for anything."

Leo and Raph shared a look, silently exchanging the words; 'touchy, touchy.'

The doors to Michelangelo's room slid open, and all turtles turned to look at the youngest family member as he scuffled his hangovered self into the world of the living. His arms hung limp at his sides, while the tails of his bandanna were wrinkled and drooled on. But the worst part was his eyes. They seemed to fight the laws of gravity on order to just stay open.

"Mornin', Sunshine," Raph greeted happily, not being able to hold back the comment, that screamed in his head to be let out.

Mike, who in spite of his hangover and foggy memories, understood well enough to know who were behind it, and shot a nasty glare at Raphael, before moving on towards the kitchen. The three brothers exchanged worried glances with each other, all fearing that Mikey would rat them out to Splinter.

* * *

After Mike had eaten some breakfast leftovers, and washed it down with some much needed water, he was stuck in the bathroom, cleaning Klunk's litter box. That was one of the many things he didn't want to do when his hangover loomed above him. He even felt like he was still a little bit drunk. All because of Leo's stupid morning practice, of which most of it he couldn't even remember.

He filtered the sand through the yellow spade, which was taped together by the handle, and dumped the smelly kitty turd into the bag he clutched in his other hand. After repeating the process several times, and still finding loads of chunks in the box, Mikey decided that enough was enough.

He angrily put down the spade to the floor, and sat there for a moment, just staring at the stinky kitty toilet. All of a sudden his entire face lit up, and he quickly dumped the bag of crap in the kitty box, that he lifted in his arms and brought with him out of the bathroom.

He made sure no one was looking, since all his brothers were occupied with watching TV, before he snuck by behind them, and slunk inside the kitchen sub-car. There, he strolled up to the trash cabinet and opened the cupboards. He bent down and poured all the kitty sand and poop into the trash can. Just as he was about to drop the crap bag into the trash, an idea struck him. So he grabbed the bag and used a couple of kleenex tissues to veil the sand and cover up his tracks, before he closed the cabinet and snuck back inside the bathroom.

* * *

Raphael went over to Don's room, after having cleaned up after dinner, and peeked inside. He found his brother by his desk, working with a couple of screws on the back of a speaker.

"Donnie," he called into the room, causing his concentrated brother to jump at the sound and drop the screwdriver. "Trash's full," he informed, sticking his head back out and leaving to watch some late night TV with Leonardo and Splinter, since Michelangelo had gone back to bed right after dinner.

Donatello sat alone in his room, sighing at the thought of that long walk to the dump again, before he gathered enough strength to get up from the chair and do his job.

* * *

Leo stretched his arms when 'Jay Leno' ended and yawned loud enough to let the entire sewer know that he was tired. He turned to Raphael on his left, who instantly began flicking for other shows the second Leno ended.

"I'm gonna go to bed," Leo announced and rose from the couch, watching his brother's reaction.

"..Sure," Raph mumbled, as he flicked by the channels in ninety miles per hour.

"Night," Leo said and left for his room.

As he got inside the darkened sub-car, he was met by a strange, and very strong stench. He followed his nose in the darkness, walking through the room and stopping by the mattress, where the source of the smell seemed to reside. He bent over and turned on his bedside lamp, this time relying on his eyes when looking back down at the mattress.

There, on his uber clean bed, laid dozens of cat chunks, spread out properly, with the biggest one polluting his pillow.

* * *

_"MIKEY!"_

Raphael flinched at the furious cry that suddenly came from his oldest brother's room, and dropped the remote control in his lap. Leonardo came storming out of his room, a look of plain evil on his face, and stomped across the living room towards Mike's sub-car, pulling the doors open with a super-heroic force.

Raph thought of going over there to check out what happened, but settled for leaning over on the couch, where the view was good enough.


	7. I'm telling Master Splinter!

**Chapter 7 -"I'm telling Master Splinter!"**

He was a man with a mission. A mission he had been putting on hold for too long. It was time. He had to face his fears and grab the bull by the horns. It was his duty as a member of his family. His obligation.

He knew it wasn't going to be easy, and that there would be times when he would just toss it aside and perhaps even stomp on it in frustration. Nevertheless, it had to be done.

Donatello finally took down the blank piece of paper he had put up on the fridge and walked over to have a seat at the kitchen table, the spot he had chosen for writing the supply list.

He searched his mind for a place to start, but just like the note before him, it came up empty. It hadn't seemed so hard when he had picked it off of that stupid chore-list, which was of course why he picked it. But it appeared he had underestimated his father's skills in keeping their fridge full.

Don sighed and put down his pen to take a look at the fridge. But there were so many things missing in there, he couldn't possibly imagine what should be standing on those empty shelves. He closed the door in defeat and returned to his chair, holding his pencil ready at the piece of paper, waiting for inspiration to strike.

Nothing.

_Okay, you can do this_, he thought to himself, trying to encourage his empty skull. _You just gotta think outside the box._

After three minutes of hard thinking and occasional writing, he looked down at the list in front of him.

_Milk._

Donnie hung his head in frustration, thinking about the short and useless list he had authored.

_Maybe I should check out the fridge again_, he thought and pulled out his chair.

* * *

Leonardo pulled aside the shower drape and bent down to pick up the newly washed sheets lying in the bathtub. He hung them properly over the tub, thinking about how good it would feel to chop off Mikey's evil little head.

Unfortunately Michelangelo had a hold on him. After he broke into his little brother's room last night to... well, beat him up about the cat faeces, Mike happily reminded him of the fact that they had gotten him drunk for practice, and that if Leo did anything that would qualify as revenge, he was more than willing to tell Splinter about their little prank.

And what was a turtle to do?

Both Donatello and Raphael had forbid him from pissing Mikey off, since yesterday's prank involved them just as much as it did Leo, if not more. Although lucky for them, Mikey blamed Leo for most of it. After all, he was the one leading practice, as well as convincing him to drink the entire bottle of poisoned water. Plus, he was already mad at Leo for stealing morning practice in the first place. So naturally, Leonardo had been the one to take the fall.

Therefor, he and Mike had signed up for a truce.

Once Leo was done eliminating wrinkles from the wet sheets, he turned around to leave for some highly earned quality time. He ran into Raph in the doorway, who had an unusually grim look on his face, even for him.

"What's up with _you_?" Leo asked, taking a moment to study his brother. "Did he get you, too?" He couldn't help sounding a little hopeful when asking, because it was only fair that the other crooks got their punishment, too.

"No," Raph snapped. "And don't look so fuckin' happy about it!"

Leonardo flinched at the f-word, realizing it must really be something if his brother brought out the heavy artillery in a PG13 rated fic, such as this one. "Then what is it?"

"I hafta clean the toilet," Raph shortly answered, before pushing himself past his big brother, and reaching inside the cabinet under the sink to fetch his ally - Mr. Muscle.

"Oh," Leo breathed, realizing he should leave if he wanted to live. There was no telling in what Raph would do if someone pissed him off when he was cleaning the family toilet. Therefor, Leo carefully backed away, his eyes cautiously observing Raphael while slowly leaving the sub-car.

He retired to the living room couch, where he began watching the seventh episode of 'Band of brothers.' Five minutes into the movie Mikey came out of his room and decided to bug his older brother.

"You watching 'Band of brothers' again?" he asked the obvious, stopping behind the couch to look at the TV.

"M-hm.." Leo mumbled, doing his best to ignore Mike.

"But 'Wildboyz'are on in five," Mikey whined, leaning over on the couch to get Leo's attention.

"Why would _I_ care?" Leonardo wondered, still staring at the TV.

"C'mon, Leo, you watch that thing all the time," Michelangelo complained, leaning further over to block the view for his brother. "And it's not like ya can't watch it later."

Leo only continued to ignore his little brother, leaning further to the right to be able to see the TV, where Mike only followed by moving closer, searching for eye contact.

"Leo, c'mon!" the orange masked turtle exclaimed in frustration, not being able to handle the cold shoulder anymore. The worst thing Mikey knew was being ignored. _Any_ kind of attention was better than no attention at all. "I know ya can see me," he insisted, only inches away from the blue masked turtle's face. "Leeeeooo..." he teased, leaning over a little closer from the back of the couch.

Leonardo scooted over a little to the right, causing his obnoxious brother to fall head first onto the couch, his body flipping over onto the floor.

"Ough!" Mike cried, when hitting his shell on the surprisingly hard surface of the subway floor. "I wasn't even touching you!"

Leo didn't answer, or even glance at the turtle on the floor, but just kept his eyes locked on the TV.

"C'mon, Leo," Mikey said, while clumsily getting to his feet. "There's no time for you to ignore me, it's starting any minute." He sat down on the couch next to his brother, waiting for some sort of reaction. "Leo?" Still nothing. _"Leo!"_

"What!" The oldest outburst suddenly, not being able to ignore the mental abuse any longer.

"It's about to start," Mike said simply. "And it's my turn to have the TV."

"No way," Leo argued. "I was here first. Plus, you haven't even cleaned your room," he added, reminding Michelangelo of Splinter's unwritten rules.

Mikey fell silent at the mention of his room, staring at the leader in shock. "You don't _know_ that," he finally said, trying to put on some sort of poker face.

"You mean to tell me that if I went inside your room _right now_, I wouldn't find anything that's not on it's rightful place?" Leo asked, staring intensely at the turtle next to him.

"...yes," Mike said, sheepishly.

"You know I'll do it," Leo calmly reminded.

"Go ahead." Mikey held his gaze. "I have nothing to hide."

Leo squinted his eyes at his little brother, as if looking for any hidden traps. Without another word spoken, Leonardo cautiously rose from the couch and walked off towards the sub-car that had 'Mikey rules' written across the doors.

Michelangelo held his position on the couch, thoroughly following Leo with his eyes, until the turtle had finally entered the disaster that was his room. He quickly threw himself at the remote and switched the DVD channel to 'MTV' where the 'Wildboyz' theme song took place. He hid the remote in between the cushions and leaned back into a comfortable position, plopping his feet onto the coffee table.

* * *

Leo disapprovingly shook his head when staring at the junk scattered across the non-swept and non-wiped floor. Michelangelo's room was far from cleaned. In fact, the very sight of the mess made the perfectionist itch all over his body, just by thinking of sharing the sewer with this war zone, that was his brother's room. Not even the bed was made.

The oldest turtle considered walking over there and doing it _for_ him, but the risk of stepping in old pizza was too high.

Leo decided he had made his point and turned around to leave. He soon spotted Mikey on his former spot on the couch, watching his stupid program behind his back.

_It was a trap,_ Leo realized, cursing himself for falling for his baby brother's cheap trick.

"You're in my seat," Leo said, crossing his arms and glaring at the guilty.

"What?" Mikey faked he was surprised and looked around himself. "Well will ya look at that!" he joked, smiling broadly.

"Move, Mikey," Leo threatened. "I'm not in the mood to argue, _especially_ not with you."

"But they're just about to wrestle with an anaconda," Mike pleaded, trying out a different technique.

"Move," Leo said, his teeth gritted.

"Fine," Michelangelo snapped and got up from his freakishly comfortable seat. "But I'm not telling you where the remote is." With that, the youngest family member walked past his brother and into his room, where he roughly closed the doors together to point out how mad he was.

* * *

Donatello wandered out into the living room, the pen and paper still in his hands, as he looked for any kind of help with the evil supply list. There was 'Wildboyz' on TV, meaning Mikey couldn't be far away. Donnie walked closer to the couch, peeking over its back to find one of his brothers on the floor, although not the one he had expected.

_"Leo?"_ Don questioned, when staring at the Fearless leader as he crawled around on all four, sticking his much too big head underneath the couch. "What're you doing?"

Leonardo looked up at his brother, irritation obvious on his features. "I'm looking for the remote," he muttered, before going back down again, scanning the luckily newly cleaned floor of the lair.

"_Thought_ there was something weird about you watching 'Wildboyz'," Don said, more to himself than anyone else. He walked around the couch, stopping next to the coffee table with the almost blank note in his hands. "Anyway, about the supply list--"

"Where the hell did he put it?" Leo hissed, rudely interrupting his younger brother.

But Don wasn't about to argue, because Leo had to be pretty mad to use that type of word. "Who?" he simply asked instead.

"Who do ya think?" Leonardo hissed, crawling around the corner of the couch. "Mikey of course!"

"Oh.." Don lit up, bending over to reach in between the cushions of the couch. "Here it is," he said, holding out the remote to his shocked brother.

Leo quickly got up on his feet and took the flicker from Don's hand. "How did _you_ know where it was?" he questioned, suspiciously staring at Donatello.

"What? Dontcha' think he's hidden it from me, too?" Donnie questioned, feeling slightly offended that his oldest brother thought of him as a suspect. "Hello-o! 'Discovery Channel' ring any bells?"

The blue clad ninja nodded in agreement, a smile curving his lips. "That _is_ true." He then sat back down on the couch and returned to the movie, flipping back to the chapter he had been watching before Mike got a hold of the remote.

"So, anyway," Donnie began and took a seat to Leo's left. "About this list..." He held up the note in his hand.

"What about it?" Leo asked, an eye ridge rising.

"Well, I sorta need some help with some of the stuff," Don shyly mumbled. "So if you could think of anything, that would be great." He looked at his brother with a pleading smile.

"I thought you said you didn't want our help?" Leo questioned, mentioning to yesterday's little tiff.

"That's not what I said," Donnie corrected. "I said _I_ wouldn't help _you_."

Leo looked at his brother for a moment before he answered. "That's not any better."

Don sighed in defeat, his fake-smile vanishing. "I know. Look, will you help me or not?" He stared impatiently at his big brother, his face twisting with worry. "Please...?" he added after a few seconds of silence.

"Fine," Leo gave in, not being able to turn down the pathetic look Donatello gave him. "How much do you have so far?"

A strange kind of silence fell over Don, as he shamefully held up the list to Leonardo. "...milk," he sheepishly admitted.

"That's _it_?" Leo exclaimed and snatched to note from his brother. He read the one word written there and looked up at Don, a perplexed expression. "You're gonna have to do better than this, Donnie."

"I know it's not one of my best," Don hastily admitted. "But I could really use the help."

Leo just gave the note back to him and returned to the movie.

"Leo?" Don persisted, waving the paper in the air to get attention. "I really need your help."

In the middle of Leo's ignoring Donatello, Mikey decided to come out of his room. "I've cleaned my room now," he announced to his oldest brother, rushing up to him. "Get off the couch," he ordered, standing next to Don and looking down at Leo.

"You couldn't _possibly_'ve cleaned your room in five minutes," Leo said, not sounding very convinced.

"I did _too_," Mike snapped, crossing his arms. "Go see for yourself."

"Oh no," Leo said, putting up his hands in defence. "I'm not falling for that one again."

"But I really _did_ clean it," Michelangelo insisted. "Now move, cuz it's my turn to have the TV."

"Well, even if you did clean your room - which, by the way, you didn't - it doesn't change anything. Because I was here first, and I'm not leaving."

"Oh yeah?" Mikey said, not being able to come up with anything better. "Well... Maybe _you_'re the one who didn't clean your room. Ever thought of that?" He raised his eye ridges in question.

Donatello couldn't help but laugh out loud, just by the bare thought of Leo's room not looking perfect. Mike sent him an angry glare, one that didn't do much to quiet the laughter.

"Whatever, Mike," Leo waved him off and turned back to the television. "My door's open if you don't believe me."

"Well maybe I don't," Mike said, hoping to get some kind of reaction from Leonardo, who just kept his eyes on the TV. He then looked over at Donnie, who had returned to the piece of paper in his hands. "What's that?" Mikey asked, curiously.

"The supply list," Don mumbled, while playing with the pencil in the corner of his mouth.

"Can I see it?" the turtle lit up, bending over to have a peek at their future food.

"No," Donatello answered firmly, quickly moving the piece of paper out of his little brother's range.

"What? I could probably help," Mike said, playing with his hands to keep them in check.

"Yeah, I don't think so, Mikey," Donnie said, returning to his list.

As no one seemed to care about Mike, or even want him there, he decided to go and check out how clean Leo's room actually was.

Donatello rose from the couch as Leo didn't seem up for helping out with the groceries. "Where's Raph?" he asked Leonardo, who judging by his concentrated facial expressions, could be miles away.

"Bathroom.." he mumbled, practically sitting on the edge of his seat.

Donnie started walking towards the loo, when an alarmed voice spoke up from behind him.

"What are ya doing?"

Don turned around to look at Leo, thinking of whether he deserved an answer or not. "I'm gonna go ask Raph for help," he said, trying to sound all snobby and distant.

"Whow, I don't think that's such a good idea," Leo said, his face twisting with uncertainty.

"What? Just because _you_ don't wanna help me, that doesn't mean he won't," Donnie said, thinking Leo was keeping him away from Raph out of brotherly jealousy.

"That's not what I meant, Don," Leo said, suddenly very down to business. "I just don't think you should talk to him right now. 'Specially not about _that_."

"Well, maybe if you had helped me, I would've cared about what you think," Don pointed out. "But since you didn't, I don't." With that, he turned around and left for the bathroom.

"Suit yourself," Leo mumbled quietly to himself, shaking his head and turning back to the movie.

* * *

Raphael reached inside the toilet with the gigantic brush, holding his left arm in front of his mouth, to keep any kind of smells from entering. Luckily, Mikey hadn't followed through with his threat, and it looked pretty clean, well at least to the untrained eye. There was some dirt stuck around the edge of the porcelain ring, where the toilet ring usually were, or at least _should_ be. Since they were all guys, it never bothered them that everyone left the toilet seat open, except for Leo and Splinter, who always had to do everything just perfect. But as Raph moved on to the floor around the toilet, he realized there were dark sides to living in a 'boys only' household.

There was a huge puddle of pee, very similar to a moat, except that it wasn't surrounding a flashy castle, but instead a stinky toilet. The piss looked very old, and also very stuck to the floor, and Raphael silently cursed Michelangelo for wanting to pee with his hands free. Mike always bragged about it like it was some sort of stunt, one he apparently wasn't very good at.

Raph got up to the sink, drenching the scouring-cloth under the tap, before showering it with Mr. Muscle. He took a couple of deep breaths, before going back down to finish the job.

As he laid there on his knees, scrubbing someone else's weewee off the floor, a voice spoke up from behind him.

"Raph, can you help me with the supply list?"

Raph felt a snappy comeback boiling up within him, and decided it was worth breathing for, even though he might have to smell the ancient urine. "For someone who's s'pose ta be smart, ya sure are stupid ta come in 'ere." Raphael turned to look over his shoulder, staring at Donatello's frozen expression by the doorway. "Someone might think ye were suicidal," he said slowly, evil gleaming in is eyes as if it was a fire born in the purgatory.

Donnie just stood there, afraid to speak or move, much less breathe. He didn't want to risk making the situation any worse, since it was clear Raphael wasn't in his best mood. Then again, who _would_ _be_ when cleaning the toilet? It's not like it's one of those places where you clean and sing at the same time.

_"Get out!"_ Raph yelled, causing his purple masked brother to turn on his heels and run for the hills, much faster than one might think possible for a two legged being, much less a turtle.

* * *

Mikey stood in Leo's uber clean room, his x-ray eyes searching for any kind of dirt or mess. However, the room was spotless, and that was pretty impressive for a place located in the sewers. His bed was made, although it didn't have any sheets, a reslut of last night's prank. Mikey proudly chuckled to himself. It was a good prank. Even worth the small beating Leo gave him.

The rest of the room looked like an add for cleaning polish; the glass table-top of his bedside table might as well not have been there. It was _so_ clean that it seemed as if the lamp floated on thin air. There were no objects lying around, not even on his desk. He had put away all of his stuff in his closet. Because Leo thought having stuff around was disorganized. In fact, the only things visible in the sub-car was the furniture and a few Japanese posters he had put up on the walls.

Basically, the room was immaculate.

Michelangelo thought of a final place to check, that even the tidiest people would forget to clean. He walked up to Leonardo's bedside table and checked the lamp-shade for any dust, running his finger around the top of it. But even _that_ came out clean.

_How many hours do ya spend in here, Leo?_ Mikey thought to himself.

One thing Mike realized when standing in his brother's room was that there would be no TV for him today. Especially since he had cleaned his own room by shoving all the junk and stuff into whatever space he could find, such as his closet and dresser.

But Mikey was never one to give up when the odds where slim, or even none for that matter. He thought of a way to earn some television time, although it involved some serious cheating. Then again, that had never stopped him before .

He walked up to Leo's closet and opened it, evilly checking out all the books and Japanese looking objects in there.

_This'll be fun,_ he thought to himself as he reached for one of Leo's super-thick books.

* * *

"C'mon, Leo," Donatello begged, holding up the list in front of him. "Just one thing. It doesn't even have to be food." He looked at his older brother, who couldn't look more unaffected, the way he stared at the TV set. "It could be anything..." Donnie desperately suggested. "Uhh.. like toothpaste - oooh, toothpaste!" he exclaimed happily, immediately scribbling down the word on his supply list.

"You sure you cleaned your room, bro?" Mikey said, coming out of Leo's sub-car with an unsettling smile growing on his face.

"What did you do?" Leo instantly asked, waking up from his tuned out state when sensing the trouble from his youngest brother's voice.

"I juz think ya should double check your room," Mike said, stopping a few feet away from Don and Leo. "I _know_ I don't know much about cleaning. Then again, it seems neither do you."

Leo flew up from the couch, walking past Donnie and pushed Michelangelo to the side as he entered his room.

"What have you _done_!" Leo shrieked from inside his room, causing Don to drop the list and get up from the couch to see what Mikey really _had_ done. The crime scene was left in total destruction. Everything Leo owned laid sprawled on the floor, with the exception of his bed, that looked like someone had used it as a trampoline.

Leo knew it would take him all day to clean this up, and being a perfectionist, he couldn't just ignore it and watch the movie anyway. Because the image of his room would haunt his mind, not leaving him at peace until it had been cleaned up. He knew Mikey knew this, and had probably counted on it as well, just so he could hog the TV. But what Mikey _didn't_ know was that if Leo was going down, he would go down with him.

Leonardo left his room and returned to the main area, with Donnie closely behind him. Mike sat on the couch with Don's supply list in front of him on the coffee table, leaning over to write something down.

"Mikey!" Donnie called, speeding up to his little brother to take it back. "I told you not to touch it!" he snapped, snatching the note from the table. Don quickly looked over the list, where twelve different varieties of frozen pizza had been added, along with ice cream and 'loads and loads of chocolate'.

Leo ignored their bickering and walked past them, calling over his shoulder as he headed for a particular sub-car. "I'm telling Master Splinter!"

Mikey instantly flew up from the couch to follow his brother into their Sensei's room. Leo eagerly knocked on the sub-car door, while keeping his knocking at a respectful level.

"Yes?" a kind voice called out from inside.

Mikey spitefully glared at Leo as the oldest turtle pulled the doors open and went inside.

* * *

Dinner time was almost upon them and Donatello sat alone in the quiet living room. Splinter had forbid both Leo and Michelangelo from watching anymore television that day, and they had both angrily retreated to their rooms. And judging by the mess, it would probably be a few hours before anyone saw Leonardo again. Mikey though, he would probably come out when he got hungry, so that couldn't take long.

Raphael was still in the bathroom, where he had been in the shower for almost forty minutes, trying to wash himself clean from the toilet scrubbing earlier. That too would probably take a while.

Then there was Don himself, alone with his supply list, with no one around to help. So far he had written down three things: milk, toothpaste and soap. He figured Raph would use up most of it for purifying reasons, if he hadn't already. But a list of three things wasn't much to give April, and he was supposed to call her after dinner to let her know what she should buy. The minutes were ticking, and the list wasn't getting any longer, to Donnie's great fear. He searched deep inside his mind for anything to add to the list, but as he once again came up empty, he realized there was only one thing left to do.

_Maybe I should check the fridge again,_ he thought to himself and got up from the couch.


	8. Did you or did you not take the movie?

**Chapter 8 - "Did you or did you _not_ take the movie?"**

Far down in the sewers, a certain mutant turtle got dressed in his very own sub-car. He had just gotten out of the shower and put on his pads, and he was now tying his red bandanna around his head, his dark brown eyes peering out of the two holes. When finished, he left his room for a different carriage, where the tired voices of his brothers could be heard. The turtle stepped inside the sub-car and walked straight up the coffee machine, bringing the coffee-pot with him as he sat down next to his blue masked sibling.

"Good morning, my son," Splinter greeted as the final family member took his seat at the breakfast table. "I hope you do not mind we started without you."

"Can't say I do," Raphael answered, pouring steaming coffee into his cup. "Though it woulda' been nice of ya ta leave somethin'," he added, after scanning the not-so-full kitchen table. He glanced at Michelangelo from across the table when putting down the coffee-pot on a coaster.

"What?" Mike exclaimed innocently. "Don't look at _me_! _I_ didn't eat it."

"Right..." Raph said sarcastically. "Juz like ye didn't use up all the hot water." He painfully remembered the freezing shower a few minutes ago.

"I _knew_ that was you," Leo cried, while pointing at the turtle in orange.

"Yeah okay, so that was me," Mike surrendered. "But I _swear_ I didn't eat your breakfast."

Raphael snorted at the comment, obviously not convinced.

"He's telling the truth," Leo stepped up and protected his little brother, even though they still weren't speaking to each other since the battle of the TV. But the eldest turtle felt responsible to stand up for justice. "None of us ate your breakfast," he continued, earning a puzzled look from Raph. "There wasn't much food when we got here in the first place," Leo finished, turning to look at this morning's chef. The rest of the family followed, staring at the purple masked turtle as he stirred his coffee in an attempt to ignore them.

"What?" Donatello finally squeaked, not being able to deal with the gawking. "There's plenty of food for you to eat. It's not like you'll starve."

Raphael held up a thin slice of bread, a critical look on his face. "Ya could've at _least_ given us somethin' ta put on these crackers."

Don quickly scanned the table for something of that kind. "There's butter," he said, pointing at the package.

"Careful, Donnie," Mike said, rubbing his empty stomach. "Ya might spoil me."

Donatello frowned at the comment and returned to his coffee.

"Honestly, Don. What happened to all the food?" Leonardo asked, setting his cup of tea down in front of him. "I mean, I know we're running out of supplies, but it's not _this_ bad."

"What?" Don said, a little ticked. "Just because I'm not serving you in bed - you complain?"

"Course he is," Mikey jumped in. "We miss the eggs and the bacon... and the cereal... oooh! And the oatmeal. And I remember that cheese I used to put on my sandwich. That was some sweet cheese..." he rambled, getting lost in the memories of past meals.

Leo rolled his eyes at his youngest brother and decided to ignore him. "Point is," he turned to Donatello. "I think you've gotten lazy."

"What?" Don said, as if he had never heard anything as ridiculous before. "I'm anything but lazy. Do you know how long it took me to write the supply list yesterday?" He was met with non impressed faces. "And do you have _any_ idea how far it is to the dump?"

Splinter smiled carefully, as he recognized himself in his son, being as he too had took the trip to the city dump - and it was no picnic. "We appreciate everything you do, my son," he told him, before looking at the rest of his children. "What _all_ of you do. I myself, if anyone, understand the hard work behind it."

The turtles suddenly felt very guilty for arguing about their chores, when Splinter usually did them all by himself. "I'm sorry, master," Leo apologized, lowering his head in respect.

"There is no need to apologize, Leonardo," Splinter turned to his oldest. "I only hope you understand the hard work behind your chores."

"We do," Mike guaranteed, hoping this was some sort of since-you've-seemed-to-learned-your-lesson-I'll-let-you-off-the-hook speech. All four turtles looked at their father with great anticipation, waiting for his answer.

"I am very pleased to hear that," the rat said, and then went back to eating his sandwich.

The four siblings looked in between each other and their father, as if checking to see if they were all seeing the same thing. Since it seemed they were, it became very obvious that the conversation was over, and that in spite of their hard work and sympathy for their master, the chores still applied to them.

Therefor, they too returned to their breakfast and continued to eat in silence, each turtle a little less happier than before they entered the kitchen.

* * *

Sometime after breakfast, Donatello headed towards the kitchen to pour himself a glass of water, since that was pretty much all they had right now. But he saw something that made him stop in the doorway and carefully peeked inside to observe his brother.

Michelangelo was busy emptying the litter box in the trash bin, and with his back turned to the doorway he failed to notice Don's shocked expression. When Mike was done he threw some tissues over the sand to cover his tracks and closed the cabinet. Only when turning around did he realize that he had been busted.

"What do you think you're doing?" Donnie asked, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Um... I uh... well, it depends on how long you've been standing there," Mikey answered with a cheesy smile.

"Long enough to know why I have to clean out the trash every other day," Don said, not moving so mush as a muscle.

"Well, okay..." Mike mumbled, while trying to come up with a logical explanation. "Then you should know that this was a one time thing - and that I've never _ever_ done it before." He looked at his brother with a creepy smile, one that of course was fake.

"Mikey.." Don sighed, while walking up to the cabinet. "It's not like walking back and forth to the dump is my favorite part of the day, because if _that_'s what you think, then I can tell you it's not."

"C'mon, Donnie," Mike happily encouraged. "Knowing you, you probably find tons of gadgets to tinker with." He playfully nudged his brother with his elbow.

"That's the junk yard - _not_ the city dump," Don strictly pointed out.

"Oh," Mikey realized, his smile shrinking fast.

"You know what," Donatello said and pushed his brother aside and opened the cabinet. "Just get out of my way." He grabbed the bag and brought it out of the trash bin, while the younger turtle shamefully watched from behind him.

"Look, man, I'm sorry," Mike truthfully apologized. "I won't do it again."

"Sure.." Donnie mumbled while closing the cupboard, clearly not convinced of his little brother's promise.

"No, really," Mike spoke up. "I'll do my own cleaning from now on."

Donatello turned around to look at his brother, not showing any signs of believing in him.

"_Really_," Mikey assured him, a small smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.

Donatello had a hard time to be angry with his little brother and fought with his conscience to stay mad, until he finally couldn't take it any more. A deep sigh escaped his throat. "You swear?"

"Till death do us part," Mike said, drawing an invisible cross on his plastron.

"Look, I don't wanna marry you, I just want you to tell the truth," Don said, his voice holding a little less anger than before.

"I do-- I mean, I _am_," Mikey quickly corrected himself, after accidentally giving wedding vows. "..telling the truth, that is."

Donnie stared at his little brother for a moment, doing a quick lie detector test, but it seemed like he came out clean. He nodded at his brother in approval before walking past him to get rid of the trash.

Mike felt relieved that he seemed to get along with at least one brother and soon left the kitchen. He walked out into the living room, which for once was empty. He glanced inside the bathroom sub-car, where Leo was filling up a bucket with water to start wiping the floors. To Mikey this meant that he got to watch something else besides 'Band of brothers.' He sat down on the couch with the remote ready in his hand, channel surfing for a couple of minutes before he decided to watch an old episode of 'Fresh Prince.'

Half way into the episode Leonardo walked past him to wipe inside the kitchen, which unfortunately meant the there wouldn't be much longer till he was done with his chores. So to secure his spot in front of the TV Mike walked up to the book shelf and grabbed the infamous 'Band of brothers' box. He quickly looked around himself to make sure no witnesses were around, before he took off with the movie towards Raphael's room.

* * *

Leonardo dipped the mop in the bucket before returning to swabbing the kitchen floor, which was always the filthiest in the mutant household. Especially around Michelangelo's chair for some reason. Although today there wasn't much, only a few crumbs, due to the poor breakfast Donnie cooked for them earlier. But then as he moved on to Raphael's chair, there was old coffee stuck to the floor. Leo traced the puddle up along the leg of the kitchen table, stopping by the edge of the surface.

_Looks like Donnie cheated_, Leo thought to himself, referring to his brother's cleaning up after breakfast.

He sighed swiftly before walking up to the chair to wipe the floor clean. But as the spot wouldn't vanish Leo stated scrubbing harder, his arms tensing in frustration. But it didn't matter how hard he scrubbed, because the coffee stain was still there, so Leo used the other end of the mop to try and scrape the stain away with the plastic edge of the swab, nonetheless it persistently remained stuck to the floor.

Leonardo dropped the mop in irritation and walked up to one of the kitchen drawers. It practically flew open with the immense force of his pull and the silverware inside it clattered and mixed up together, forks landing among the spoons and so on. He quickly grabbed a fork and went back to the immortal stain by Raphael's chair, not knowing who he was most angry with; Raph for spilling it or Don for not cleaning it up.

He bent down on his hands and knees and stared carving it off with the fork, pleased to see that it was actually working. Unfortunately as the coffee came off, so did some of the floor, or at least the paint it was painted with. Which was actually ironic, because the kitchen was the only sub-car with intact floor, or at least it had been up until now.

During his panic he began gathering up the yellow pieces of paint with his hands and collected them in his left palm. He swiftly looked around the kitchen for a place to dump them without anyone being able to trace the clues back to him. He rushed up to the sink and washed them down the drain with hot water. He turned around and looked at the palm sized hole in their floor, his breathing beginning to hyperventilate.

* * *

Michelangelo hastily knocked on the sub-car wall before stepping through the open doors.

"What do ya want?" Raph asked with an irritated tone of voice as the youngest turtle appeared in his room.

"Nothing," Mike said. "Juz hang out with my favorite brother." He walked up to Raph where he sat on his mattress and sorted out his CD's, putting them back in their cases, or at least the ones that still had them left. Because like most of the stuff in the temperamental ninja's room - they were broken.

Raph snorted at the comment, still not looking up from the disc in his hands. "I'd appreciate it if ye took yer head outta my ass and cut to the chase."

"What?" Mike asked innocently. "I don't need a reason to spend time with my brother, do I?"

"Any other guy - sure. But you..." Raph trailed off, not needing to say anything else.

"What, I juz came in here to see what you're doing," Mike insisted, while glancing around the room for a place to hide the 'Band of brothers' box.

"Fine," Raph said and looked up at Mike, who instantly turned to look at him while trying to appear casual. "I'm cleaning - get out."

"What?" Mikey smiled and walked up to stand in front of his older sibling. "You don't need any help with the CD's? Cuz I'm the best there is in the 'sorting out piles of unlabeled CD's' market."

"How _can_ ya, when most of the ones in yer room are mine?" Raph countered, a cynical look on his face.

"You're free to take 'em any day," Mikey offered with a big smile, while hiding the movie box behind his shell.

"Alright," Raphael said and rose to his feet. "An' juz so ye know, I'll kill ya if ye touch anythin'."

"Pinky swear," Mikey promised and held up a curved finger.

Raph only grunted and walked past him to reclaim what Mike had unofficially stolen.

The second the red masked turtle was out of view Mike bent down and started rummaging through the pile of already sorted out CD's. He quickly picked out five cases of home-made music and opened them on the bed in front of him. He then folded up the DVD box he'd carried with him and removed the 'Band of brothers' discs to place each of them in Raph's CD cases, _underneath_ the resident CD's of course. He then quickly shut them closed and put them back in the pile Raph had heaped up on the floor by his bed.

Just as he had returned to his position on the floor, with the now empty DVD box behind his back, Raphael returned with a bunch of CD's in his hands. He stopped in the doorway to quickly inspect his room for any changes and finally settled with his eyes on Mikey.

"I didn't touch a thing," Mike said, feeling slightly uncomfortable with the stare his older brother gave him. However he handled it quite well and didn't give himself away. "You wanna check the room for fingerprints?" he asked as Raph wouldn't stop glaring at him.

Raph decided to believe his little brother and walked over to his mattress where he sat back down to sort out the rest of the CD's, ignoring Mike while doing so.

"You sure you don't need any help?" Mikey asked after a moment of silence.

Raphael looked up at the orange clad turtle, his eyes telling him to back off.

"Okay.." Mike mumbled and backed out of the room, making sure Raph couldn't see the DVD box he hid behind him.

When back in the living room, Mike set off the Donatello's room to hide the rest of the loot.

* * *

Donatello was a couple of minutes away from the lair, ankle deep insewage water. He certainly didn't feel like walking the long strode to the dump and as he spotted an old sandwich floating by, he was hit with an idea. Maybe it wasn't one of his best, but it definitely made his trash chore a little less depressing.

He turned left at the nearest tunnel and put down the garbage bag on the dry cement surafece adjoined to the water. He then quickly turned to leave as a part of him forced him to turn around and look at the trash he'd left behind. He heard Splinter's voice in his head, telling him that the hard way was always the right way. But another, much lazier part of himself, pushed the thought into the far corner of his mind and pulled him away from the crime scene. Instead he headed off to his favorite place: the junk yard.

* * *

As Mikey was finished with hiding the DVD box and returned to the living room to watch some dearly missed TV, he found the object already occupied by someone else.

"Master Splinter?" he questioned in surprise at the sight of the old rat in his chair with the remote gripped in his right hand.

"Yes.." Splinter mumbled while staring intensely at the television screen.

"What're you watchin'?" Michelangelo walked up to the couch to get a better view at the TV.

" 'Days of our lives', " the rat answered, never taking his eyes off the TV.

Mikey sighed deeply as he sank down onto the couch, cursing at himself for forgetting about the soap opera his father watched on a daily basis.

Leonardo came out of the bathroom after having finished cleaning the lair. He quickly noticed the show Splinter was watching and walked up to have a seat next to Mikey. "How long've you been watching, master?" he asked, while making himself comfortable on the couch.

"A couple of minutes," Splinter answered. "Stefano is just about to admit to his adopted sister that he impregnated her with their dead stepfather's semen."

"But I thought it turned out he _wasn't_ dead?" Leo wondered, looking from the TV to his sensei.

"No, that was his evil twin brother," Splinter explained, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Oh," Leo nodded in understanding, completely lost in the dysfunctional world of daytime television. Then they both returned their attention to the TV.

Mike only rolled his eyes and got up from the couch to do something a little less depressing.

* * *

Donatello sat by the desk in his room, working on a small TV set he found in the junkyard. It was pretty much intact, apart from some wires inside of it that needed replacement. His concentration was however broken as the frustrated voice of Leonardo ripped through their home.

Don rose from his chair and left to check out what was going down in the living room, where Leo stumbled around searching for something. "I know you took it, Mikey," he accused his younger brother who was standing by the couch and watching. "So tell me where you hid it!"

"C'mon, Leo.." Mike said, moving out of the way as Leo lifted the couch cushions to look underneath them. "Don't ya think you're being a bit paranoid?"

The blue masked turtle looked up from the couch, irritation playing on his features. "You turned my room into a war zone for Pete's sake!"

Mikey chuckled at Leo's attempt to transform his anger into words. "Pete's sake?" he repeated with a grin. "Dude, honestly.."

"Not now, Mikey," Leo threatened with gritted teeth. "Where _issit_?"

"What's going on?" Donnie asked as he walked up to his two brothers.

"Mike hid 'Band of brothers'," Leo answered and rose to his feet.

Don looked from Leo's stern features to Mikey, who did his best to hold back a smile. "Did you?" Donatello asked, trying to read Mike's body language.

"No," the youngest insisted. "What? Juz cuz his stupid movie's gone missing you immediately think it's _me_?" He pointed to himself with his right hand.

"Well, you _did_ dump Klunk's number two's on his bed," Don reasoned, earning an enthusiastic nod from Leo.

"Only cuz you got me drunk," Mikey reminded his two siblings.

"Maybe we wouldn't've, had you treated us a little better for morning practice," Leo argued, angrily stepping closer to Michelangelo.

Don got in between the two and broke them up, pushing them aside with a hand on teach turtle. "Okay-okay. Both _very_ good points," he said, trying to cool them off. "But let's not get ourselves carried away here."

"_He_ started it," Mikey muttered, pointing to the oldest turtle, who's eye ridges shot up in response.

"Mike," Donnie turned to the shorter turtle, his eyes telling him to shut up. "Did you or did you _not_ take the movie?"

"I totally didn't," Michelangelo answered, ignoring the outrageous look Leonardo sent him.

"You lying little prick," Leo grabbed after Mikey, Don stopping him with both arms.

"Leo, he said he didn't do it," the purple masked turtle told his oldest brother.

"Right. Just like he didn't break my airplane model," Leo added, glaring at the guilty.

"I was six!" Mikey defended himself, getting tired of his brother bringing that up every time he did something wrong.

"You still did it on purpose!" Leonardo angrily pointed out.

"I give up," Donnie sighed and collapsed onto the couch, rubbing his temples to rid himself of the headache that just arrived. Of course, Leo and Mike didn't notice that their brother withdrew himself from the argument as they focused on bickering with each other.

* * *

Splinter, who had retreated to the kitchen with a cup of tea, had heard the entire argument and he had hoped Donatello's brave attempt to silent them would have worked. But his sons' voices were louder than ever so Splinter did the only thing left to do and left the kitchen for his room. As he strode behind his children in the living room, Michelangelo took a break in his bickering and turned to him.

"Where you going, sensei?" he asked, a look of worry on his face.

The other two turtles turned to look at their father as they realized he was in the same room. Donatello had a tired look on his face, as if hoping the old rat would be able to help, while Leo seemed to be ashamed that his master had heard him lose his temper and yell at his brother.

"I thought I would meditate for a while," Splinter answered while looking at his sons. "Let me know when dinner is ready." He then grabbed a stronger hold of his wooden cane and fled into the safety of his sub-car, where neither of his sons could ask him to choose sides.

When Splinter was gone, it seemed the argument was too. Both Leonardo and Mikey stood staring at Splinter's closed door, while Donnie simply enjoyed the silence he'd been blessed with.

"He's been doin' that a lot lately," Mike realized and turned to Leo. "Hasn't he?"

* * *

Splinter sat down on the rug he'd positioned in the centre of room. He placed his cup of tea next to him and crossed his legs to begin another session of 'closing his noisy sons outside.' But just as he was about to close his eyes he noticed something in the corner of his right eye.

The Ficus in the far corner looked rather... dead, or at least on the verge of it. Then as Splinter checked the rest of the plants in his room he noticed they too were suffering from the same syndrome. The 'Michelangelo gave me too much water' syndrome, and now they were simply suffering the consequence of it.

The old rat realized he had to bring out heavier stuff for this meditation session, if he was going to be able to relax. So he got up from the floor and walked up to his closet, where he kept most of his belongings. There, a lonely candle resided on one of the shelves. Not too long ago the shelves had been stuffed with candles, given to him on various father's days and Christmas presents. But it seemed like his children cleaning their home equalled in himself using up his candle supply.

_There are downsides to everything_, Splinter calmly reminded himself. Although it seemed this particular situation had more than just one side-effect.

* * *

BTW: _I know nothing about 'Days of our lives.' I do know there is a guy called Stefano, but that's pretty much all I know. I made up everything else, so if you're big fans of the show, please don't yell at me for getting it completely wrong. Adios!_


	9. What on earth is that?

****

Chapter 9 - "What on _earth_ is that?"

Sunday had arrived and Donatello was scheduled to pick up their supplies at April's. He opened his closet to fetch his disguise, but as he reached inside, the coat accidentally fell off the hanger and landed on the dark floor of the closet. Don bent down to pick it up and as he did he discovered there was something else down there as well. He lifted his trench coat to unveil a DVD box underneath it, and before even reading the title on the cover he _knew_ what it said.

"Leo," he called, still sitting on the floor with the DVD in one hand and his clothing in the other. "You might wanna come in here."

The oldest turtle, who had been on his was to the dojo to brush up on his katas, turned in the direction of Donatello's room and peeked inside the doorway. "What's up, Donnie?"

"You recognize _this_?" Don held up the DVD box for his brother to see.

Leo's eyes widened in joy and instantly rushed up to his hero and grabbed the movie. "Where did you find it?" he asked, while admiring the feel of 'Band of brothers' in his hands.

"Bottom of my closet," Don answered as he rose to his feet.

The joy in Leonardo's eyes vanished instantly to be replaced with anger.

"I'm guessing by the look on your face _you_ didn't put it there," Donnie said, wincing at his older brother.

"Mikey.." Leo muttered, grabbing the box tighter.

"It's who I'd put _my_ money on," Don agreed, while sliding his arms into the trench coat. "Just please don't go after him. The movie's back and everyone's happy."

Leo looked up with the complete opposite emotion on his features.

"Okay, so not _every_one," Don sheepishly admitted and buttoned up his coat. "Just don't do anything, Leo. Can't ya just let this one slide?"

"This _one_?" Leo repeated, his eye ridges shooting up. "I've done nothing _but_ keeping my mouth shut."

"While that's not entirely true, I guess you've been more patient than most people would've." Donnie reasoned and reached inside the closet to grab his fedora. "Look, just don't kill each other while I'm gone. Go watch the movie or something." He closed the closet and put on his hat before turning back to Leo. "All right?"

Leo's features remained stern, obviously not so crazy about the idea.

"All _right_?" Don repeated, boring his eyes into Leonardo's.

"All right," Leo gave in with a deep sigh. "I won't bring it up."

"Good," Donnie said and patted the not-so-happy turtle on his shoulder. "I'm countin' on both of you to still be alive when I get back."

Leo nodded and moved aside so Don could pass by him. He watched as Donatello headed up the stairs and climbed the exit ladder before he went out to the living room to put in the movie. He opened the DVD box to find a single disc in there - the special features disc. All five containing the episodes were conveniently still missing.

* * *

Inside the kitchen of a certain news reporter, Donatello sat by her bar-table, dropping toilet-paper into the paper bags lined up in front of him.

"Thanks for picking up all these stuff," he said, glancing at April's back while she searched her refrigerator for anything else that might belong to her reptilian friends... and their rat of a father, of course.

"Don't worry about it," April answered while grabbing some cheese from one of the shelves. "Besides.." She turned around to Donnie and dropped the yellow piece of grocery down one of the bags. "It's not like you're able to do much shopping on your own." A friendly smile curved her lips.

"Yeah well, thank God," Don praised, his dark brown eyes doing a three-sixty in their eye sockets. "Just _imagine_ the things Mikey'd stuff our fridge with. Judging by the things he added to the supply list - behind my back, nonetheless - we'd all be too fat to even fit down the manholes."

April laughed at the image of four obese ninja turtles, squeezing their colossal butts through the manholes of New York's sewer system. She turned around to double-check the fridge for anything else of theirs. "Wouldn't that be a sight?" she mused, holding the refrigerator door open with her right arm stretched to its fullest potential. "So if you can't think of anything else.. I'd say that's about it." She glanced at Don over her shoulder.

Donatello peeked inside the bags, making sure he had everything he came for. "Looks like everything's here," he confirmed with his head down one of the bags.

April nodded and closed the door to the fridge. "Yeah, and about that list..." She turned back to her seated friend. "I hope you're not still mad at me for talking Splinter into putting you to work."

"Don't worry about it," Don said, waving off her comment. Although there had been a few times in doing his chores where he had cursed her once of twice. "It's only fair we clean up down there. Sides, I don't think we'll have to do it much longer." A hint of a smile pulled at the corner of his mouth as Don broke away from her eyes, secretly looking forward to that certain place in time.

"Oh?" April questioned with an arched eyebrow, causing Donnie to look back at her. "What makes you say that?" She leaned her lower arms on the bar-counter.

"I guess you could say that things haven't gone as smoothly as Splinter might've hoped," the turtle sheepishly admitted, folding his hands together. "We've probably caused more problems than we've solved, and the chores haven't exactly strengthened our brotherly bonds."

"Raph and Leo, huh?" April nodded in understanding, wincing a little at the thought of what those two might've done to each other.

"No, actually.. Leo and Mikey," Donnie corrected the brunette, who's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Yeah, Mikey hasn't exactly been on his best manners." He nodded, fiddling with his fingers. "And Leo's the one who's been the most exposed to his pranks."

"What _kind_ of pranks?" April asked worriedly, eyeing her green friend.

"The kind where Klunk's doo doo's end up on Leo's bed," he answered, painting a disgustingly vivid picture by using only one sentence.

"What?" April practically gasped. "No, he didn't," she said, half pleading, half demanding.

"Yeah," Donnie confirmed with a slow nod. "He did."

April looked away from his stare, trying to process the repelling information she had just been given. "I can't believe anyone's actually able to do anything like that. Even Mikey."

"Ask Leo," Don suggested, causing April to look back at him. "He's a believer."

April thoughtfully put her hand to her chin, covering half of her mouth. "I bet," she said, glancing at Donnie.

"Oh!" Don lit up at the memory of more gossip. "And just yesterday? Mikey hid Leo's DVD in my closet. Found it just before I left. Actually, it's the one he borrowed from you."

"'Band of brothers'?" April questioned, wondering why her creative little green buddy would put it in his brother's closet.

"Yeah, that's the one." Donatello nodded, moving on to answering the question that was plastered on her face. "He doesn't like Leo hogging the TV."

April nodded understandingly, studying Donnie as he seemed to board one of those train of thoughts he so often took off with. "What?" she asked, trying to pull some information out of him.

Don shook his head, still appearing to be deep in thought. "Leo seemed pretty mad when I left." He paused, as if for dramatic effect. He glanced at April, who's eyes urged him to continue. Once again he broke away from her curious gaze and stared into nothingness. "I just hope he's behaving himself."

* * *

Leonardo sat on his knees in front of Donatello's open closet and grabbed another half-dead toaster from inside it, one that Donnie had saved for the purpose of spare parts, just like the rest of the stuff he overpopulated his closet with. The blue masked turtle threw the piece of junk over his shoulder and onto the growing pile of broken machines and unfinished gadgets. The toaster made a crashing sound once it landed on top of it all, causing Klunk to rush out from underneath Don's desk, where he could usually hide in peace.

"Where _issit_?" Leo growled to himself, grabbing another UFG (unidentified flying gadget) and tossed over his shoulder. He was of course referring to the five still missing discs of 'Band of brothers' and it only made sense that they would be in his purple clad brother's closet, like the rest of the DVD's had been. And he couldn't exactly ask Michelangelo about it. Doing so he knew he would risk breaking his promise in not to kill him.

Once again he cursed himself for giving into Donatello's stupid agreement.

After ridding the closet of its last UFG, Leo had to face the fact that his missing episodes weren't there. He sighed in frustration and got up to his feet, brushing his knees free of dust and microscopic screws he'd been buried under. Once turning around tothe humongous pile of crap, his head tiredly fell backwards, thinking of all the time it would take him to clean up the mess. A spent hand reached up to rub his face, trying to bring some life to himself.

_This_ had obviously not been a good idea.

* * *

Inside the kitchen Raphael was busy doing the dinner's dishes by the sink. He placed a clean plate to the side to dry and reached inside the dirty water for another item to scrub clean. A fork found its way into his grip and he quickly ran the dish brush over it, not so picky with the task. After washing it off under the tap, the newly washed fork slipped out of his wet grip and landed on the floor by his feet. He bent down with a grunt to reclaim it, only to be met with a nasty smell. He found his face inches away from some left over food on the floor by the trash cabinet. After quickly deciding it didn't look like the dinner he had served this evening, he rose to his fully length and turned around to the kitchen doorway.

"Leo!" he called, waiting for his brother's reply.

None came.

_"Leo!"_ he yelled a second time, this time louder than before.

"What?" an irritated voice answered from inside one of the other sub cars.

"I got a job for ya," Raphael informed, returning to the dishes.

Leonardo appeared in the doorway, crossing his arms with a suspicious look on his face. "What kind of job?" he asked, causing Raph to spin around and look at him. "I've done my chores for the day."

" 'Parently not good enough," Raph said, stepping aside and motioning with his eyes to the spot on the floor.

"What're you talking about?" Leo wondered, standing too far away to see what Raphael was looking at.

"I dunno," Raph replied and crossed his arms on his plastron. "You tell me."

Leo walked up to the trash cabinet and bent down to look at the spot Raph was referring to. "What _is_ that?" he wondered, wrinkling his beak in disgust. Even though he couldn't identify the smudge he could definitely smell it.

"Somethin' you forgot to clean up," Raphael answered, causing his brother to look up at him from where he stood bent.

Leo's face twisted in disapproval. "You're saying that's _my_ problem?" He rose to look his younger brother in the eyes.

"You're the one wipin' the floors aroun' here, aren't ya?" Raph countered, challenging his brother's stare.

"Not when _you_ spill dinner on the floor, I'm not," Leonardo argued, holding his brother's gaze and standing his ground.

"I didn't spill that," Raph objected, hastily pointing to the floor with his eyes before returning to the battle of the brothers' eyes.

"Then who did?" Leo asked, not backing down.

"I dunno," Raph shrugged. "Does _that_ look like lasagne ta you?"

Leo parted from their staring contest and bent back down to the floor, inspecting the stain further. "Actually, no," he admitted. "What _is_ that?" The shrivelled piece of food was covered in penicillin, making it very hard for the Fearless leader to identify it.

"I don't care. I'm not cleaning it up," Raphael informed his older brother, who had to cover his beak when inspecting the crime scene.

Leo looked up at Raph, glancing back down to the smudge again. "You think it's lunch?" he asked and rose back up to normal height.

An evil smile spread across Raph's face. "Could be..." he agreed.

They both turned their heads in the direction of the door, gathering air into their lungs before calling in the third party._ "Mikey!"_

It didn't take long for the youngest turtle to enter the kitchen. "What's up, bros?" he wondered, walking up to his older brothers.

"Spilling food much?" Leo asked, keeping his voice calm.

"Whaddaya mean?" Mikey wondered, furrowing his eye ridges in confusion.

"Yeah, that's right," Raphael filled in. "We know about yer little 'hit n' run' accident." He pointed to the stain on their kitchen floor.

"My _hit_ and _run_?" Mike repeated, his eye ridges moving up a floor. He stepped up to investigate the spot on the floor that Raph was pointing to. He bent closer to get a better look at the surprisingly smelly stain. "What?" He looked up at the other two. "Ya think _I_ did that?" His older brothers nodded. "I totally didn't," Mikey quickly objected. He was met by two stern faces. "Well, I didn't," he insisted.

"Then who do you suggest did?" Leonardo asked, still unconvinced of his little brother's words.

"That looks more like dinner, to me," Mike said, glancing at the turtle in red.

"Looks like _dinna_'?" Raph repeated, as though he had never heard anything as ridiculous before. "That's funny, cuz I don't rememba' servin' penicillin."

"So then what makes ya think it's lunch?" Michelangelo turned the question around, pointing to the subject stuck to the floor.

"Cause it's just like you to not clean it up," Leo pointed out, while trying to keep his promise about not killing Mikey.

"That's not fair," Mike protested, narrowing his eyes at Leo. "I've done lunch far better than you ever could."

Raphael snickered and sent his elbow into Leonardo's left side. "At least ye gotta give 'im that," he said, looking at his not-very-amused big brother.

"Very funny," Leo scolded Raphael before turning back to Mikey. "But the question still stands. Who's gonna mop it up?" The three brothers looked between each other, none of them stepping up for the job.

And like an answer from above, a voice called out to them from the living room. "Guys?"

Three evil smiles decorated the faces of the three brothers, while the forth appeared in the sub car doorway, hidden behind the grocery bags he carried in front of his plastron.

"Uhh.. a little help?" Donatello peeked out from behind one of the bags, a pleading look on his face.

Mikey and Leonardo stepped up to unload their personal supply deliverer, each of them grabbing a bag so that Don only had to carry one. They set the bags down on the kitchen table. Don took off his fedora and placed it on the table before he stared unpacking the bags.

Mikey and Raph quietly motioned for Leonardo to talk to Donnie. Leo's eye ridges rose in protest, wondering why _he_ had to do it. Raph angrily held up the dish brush to smack Leo with it and Leo quickly moved aside, giving into their demands.

"Don..?" The oldest turtle said after a moment, causing his purple masked brother to look up from the bag with a loaf in one of his hands. "You take out the trash, right?" Leo carefully asked, secretly glancing at his other brothers.

"Yeeeaaah...?" Don answered, wondering where the question was leading.

"Good," Leo said with a nod. "Cause there's a little something over there that might've missed the bin." He pointed towards the mysterious spot on their kitchen floor.

Donatello put the loaf of bread on the table, suspiciously glancing at his strangly quiet siblings as he strolled up to the trash cabinet. He noticed the spot Leo was talking about and bent down closer to see what it was. Just like the others he was unable to identify it, however the smell definitely made itself known to him.

Don quickly bent back up, covering his beak from the stench. "What on _earth_ is that?" he asked, looking in between the other three.

"Don't know," Leo hastily admitted. "But.. with being in charge of the garbage dumping and all, you should pick that up."

Don's eyes widened in shock of what he had just been told. "You're kidding," he protested. "I'm not touching that." He then looked at the other two, who even they seemed very eager for him to clean it up. "What? Y-You've just.. _waited_ for me to get back, so any of you didn't have to do it?"

There was a slight moment of hesitation before three sets of heads nodded to affirm his statement.

Don let out a breath of disbelief, a tired smile playing on his lips while looking at his siblings. "No way," he objected, putting his right hand to his forehead. "I'm not cleaning it up. Besides, isn't that part of the 'wipe and sweep' job, _Leo_?" He turned to his brother in question, the other turtles following.

"What?" Leo turned to Mike and Raph for support. "So now it's _my_ problem?"

"Majority rules," Raph said, a malicious smile curving his lips.

Leonardo shook his head in disbelief and turned to Michelangelo, who in response made a swabbing gesture with his hands, pretending to be wiping the floor.

"No," Leo protested. "It's not fair you ganging up on me like that."

"All right," Don said, as an idea struck him. He walked across the kitchen to the table where they had put all the paper bags. He reached inside one of them and brought out a package of spaghetti.

"What are you doing?" Mikey wondered, his curiosity about to overtake him.

Don simply ignored his brothers and ripped the package open, pulling out four strings of solid spaghetti. He broke them in half and dropped four halves back on the table. Then, hidden behind his shell, he mixed them up before he brought them back in his right hand for the others to see. Each straw appeared to be as long as every other. "Short one lose," Donnie said simply, holding them out for his siblings to each take one.

"Alright!" Mikey lit up. "Way to go, Einstein." He hurried up to pick a straw, getting the best chance of not having to clean up the stinky smudge.

Raph quickly snatched himself a straw, not wanting to be the last one out. Leo however, he sure took his sweet time when deciding between the final two. His hand slowly floated over the spaghetti strings, wagering back and forth with uncertainty.

"Oh for Christ's sake!" Donnie complained, causing Leo to draw back his hand in surprise. "Just pick one!"

The oldest turtle finally settled for the left, leaving Don with the last one to himself. The four ninjas inspected their straws as well as the others', before holding them out to measure who the loser would be.

"Well it's not mine," Raph declared, his straw two inches taller than the others.

"I think it's yours, Leo," Donnie finally decided, after having inspected each straw several times.

"What?" Leo outburst. "No way! Mikey's shorter than mine!" He held up his straw beside Michelangelo's and all four turtles moved in closer to be able to judge.

"No," Don mumbled, his eyes locked on the straws. "I'd say yours the shortest."

Mike chirped victoriously before sticking out his tongue to the blue clad loser.

"Fine," Leo mumbled, tossing his straw into the sink. "Who cares about this stupid game, anyway?" With three turtles giggling behind him, Leonardo exited the kitchen to fetch a bucket of water and the always so trustful mop.

Raphael returned to the dishes while Mikey offered to help Don pack up their food, mainly to see what his brother had brought home for him to eat when they weren't looking.

"So how's April?" Raph asked while scrubbing a glass.

"She's fine," Don answered as he went to put some milk in their fridge. "She wanted to know if we were still upset about her coming up with the list and all."

"Yeah.." Raph mumbled, washing the glass under the tap. "Bet Leo is."

Donnie snickered at the comment before closing the fridge and going back to the table, where Mike had his head down one of the bags, rummaging for anything and everything he could eat.

"Mikey!" Don chirped, pulling on his little brother's arm. "That's not helping."

"Where's the ice cream and pizza?" Michelangelo wondered, looking as if someone had just run over his cat.

"There _is_ no ice cream and pizza," Donatello informed, pushing himself past Mikey to be able to reach inside the bag.

"What?" Mikey cried, almost on the verge of tears. "But I wrote it on the list."

"Yeah..." Don said, lifting up a bag of potatoes into his arms. "Not on my watch, buddy."

* * *

Donatello lazily dangled his legs over the edge of the roof top, eleven stories up, observing the calm city beneath him. Not much was out there this night. Nothing but the sound of a few cars that drove by from time to time, and the teenage gang that they had been watching for thirty minutes didn't seem up for any illegal activity, having only stood there on the side walk, talking.

He turned to Raphael on his left, who eagerly twirled one of his sais in his right hand, hungering for some action other than 'late night roof top stakeout.'

"Nothing's happening, Raph," Don sighed, leaning back on his hands.

"Ye don't know that," Raphael spat, turning to glare at him. "Those thugs could break into that hardware story any sec."

"Yeah?" Don questioned, raising an eye ridge. "I don't think it would take them thirty minutes to muster up the courage. Let's just go home." Don supported his weight on his left arm and rose to his feet.

"I knew you'd be a bore," Raph said, still not moving.

"I'm not a bore," Don objected, staring down at his older brother.

"Sure ye are," Raph looked up at him. "You've been blabberin' about goin' back eva' since we left the lair."

"I have not," Donnie protested, getting a little ticked off by the comment.

"Hey," Raph said, putting up his hands in defence. "I'm not stoppin' ye. If ya wanna leave - leave. I'll manage."

"Don't turn this around and make _me_ look like the bad guy." Don accusingly pointed at his brother.

"I'm not," Raph said. "I'd be scared too if I'd been out past _my_ curfew."

This got Don to sit back down, glaring at Raphael out of the corner of his eye, but not saying anything.

Raph only smiled to himself, proud over the fact that he outsmarted his braniac brother.Then again,reverse psychology seemed to work on everyone. Except for Splinter, of course.

Donatello returned to watching the teens across the street, fiddling with his thumb against the concrete surface of the roof.

_I should've just swallowed my pride and left_, he thought to himself, getting more and more bored by the second. After all, he had better things to do than baby-sit some kids.

"So what diddya think about Leo's session this mornin'?" Raphael asked, still not turning his head away from the teenage group.

Don spun his head around in surprise, having not expected his brother to speak. "I don't know," he said, turning back to looking at the teens. "Kind of boring, I suppose."

"Wasn't it?" Raph agreed, turning to look at Don, who met his gaze. "I mean, what happened ta Fun Leo?"

"Fun _Leo_?" Don repeated with a smile. "I haven't seen him since Mikey sobered." The two of them laughed a little, although quietly enough so the kids wouldn't be able to hear it.

"Man, I sure hope Splinter won't find out about us spikin' his water," Raph said, staring into the city night.

"Tell me about it," Don agreed, also turning to look ahead of him. "We'd be doing flips into our sixty's." Again they snickered, with the quiet night following afterwards.

"Guess them kids won't break into any stores t'night," Raph quietly admitted, rising to his feet.

Don wasn't late to follow, a small smile playing on his lips for being right.

Raphael stuck his sai back in his belt and looked up at his brother. "Why you so eager ta leave, anyway?" he wondered.

Don scratched himself behind his head. "Yeah, see I found this TV back at the junkyard, and I've been pretty set on fixing it."

"A TV, huh?" Raph asked, interested. "You gonna put it in yer room?" He started walking back the way they came.

"That's the idea," Donnie confirmed, walking next to him. "I'm kinda looking forward to not have to fight over the remote every time I don't wanna watch 'Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.'"

"Ya know you've always been my favorite brother, right?" Raphael said, putting his arm around Don's shoulders.

"Right.." Don mumbled, pushing Raph's arm off of himself.


	10. Ya gonna diagnose us?

**Chapter 10** **- "Ya gonna diagnose us?"**

It was Monday and the oldest turtle had locked himself inside his room. He needed his privacy when meditating and that was something he simply couldn't find in the company of his brothers. Apart from that, he was still mad at Michelangelo for not telling him where he'd hidden the DVD's, and the further Leo pushed his little brother to confess, the bigger grew Mikey's threat about ratting him out to Splinter for getting him drunk.

Leonardo was stuck in a no win situation and therefor locked himself inside his room to calm himself down.

He sat on his mattress, his legs crossed and his eyes closed, where he slowly but surely blocked out the screaming voices of his brothers from the living room, where they had been playing video games since lunch.

It didn't take long for Leo to become relaxed, after all - he had done this many times before. But just as he felt his thoughts and problems began to vanish, another problem called for his attention.

Leonardo worriedly opened his eyes and caressed his stomach, wincing at the cramping pain that came from inside it. If he didn't know any better, he almost felt as if he was about to--

Leo's eyes widened in terror and he quickly clutched a hand over his mouth.

It looked like this particular problem was about to surface.

* * *

Inside the living room Raphael was busy kicking Mike's ass in another round of 'Dead or Alive.' Mikey's poor character was trapped to the right side of the screen, where Raph continuously kept kicking her.

"Raph, c'mon!" Michelangelo whined, pushing his older brother in his right side. "At least give me a chance."

Raph only snickered, ignoring his little brother's plea for mercy as his animated character continuously tried to get up, without much luck.

"Raph!" Mike complained, trying to snatch the remote from his rival. "It's not funny anymore!"

As the two of them were wrestling for the power of the 'Playstation 2' control, the doors to Leonardo's room slid open. The two turtles turned their attention to the sub-car as the owner of it burst out of the room, sprinting past his siblings on his mission to the bathroom, where disturbing noises began to take form.

"The hell?" Raph growled to himself and got up from the couch to go after his big brother. _"LEO!"_ he outburst as he appeared in the bathroom doorway. "Whattahell do ya think yer doin'!"

Even though Leo's head was halfway down the toilet he could still hear his brother, but the upchucking made it kind of hard for him to answer. He clutched his hands around the porcelain ring and opened his mouth for another departure of today's lunch.

_"Leo!"_ Raph howled, getting more and more upset with the behaviour of their Fearless Leader. "I juz cleaned that toilet!"

"...sha'...up.." Leo murmured in between vomiting.

"What's going on?" Mikey asked as he stepped up beside Raphael in the doorway, peeking over his shoulder to get a better view. "Du-ude," he squealed, covering his beak in disgust. "That's so gross!"

"...gettaw.." Leo gulped, before another load of food came up his throat.

"What was that?" Mikey wondered, looking at Raphael for a translation.

"Get _out_!" Leo yelled, this time looking up at the two, although not for very long as porcelain duty called yet again.

"Yeah well, _I_ aint't cleaning," Raph declared as he pushed Mike away from the scene and went back to the couch. Raphael sat down on the armrest as Michelangelo stood on the floor, his face twisting in disgust at the sound still coming from the bathroom sub-car.

"He could've at least closed the door," Mike said, looking at Raphael, who only sent his brother an unimpressed glare in return.

"That'll be the _least_ of his problems when he's done," Raph growled, thinking about all the cleaning that had to be done in their bathroom.

Mikey leaned over to peek inside the bathroom, where Leo still sat on his knees, his head down the toilet. "Man, I hope it's not catching," he mumbled, taking a moment to see how his stomach felt.

"Catching?" Raph repeated, a mocking look on his face. "Right, so who'd Leo get it from - the rats? Or maybe Klunk?"

Mike smiled sheepishly, shrugging his shoulders. "Ya never know."

A moment later they heard the toilet flush and the water tap being turned on. Not long after that, a pale Leonardo staggered out of the bathroom, his hands grabbing his stomach. "I don't feel so good," he murmured, collapsing on the couch next to Raphael, who tensed a little at the armrest, even though he hadjust told his little brother it wasn't contagious.

"No kidding," Mikey commented, sitting down on the coffee table. "Ya don't look so good, either. And I'm not juz talking about your usual charming self."

Leo glared at his brother, pulling his arms around himself to warm up.

"I sure hope ye cleaned up afta' yerself," Raph added, with no trace of worry on his voice.

"Shut up, Raph," Leo said, sinking deeper into the couch. "Can't you see I'm sick?"

"Yeah, ye look like shit," Raph pointed out, crossing his arms. "But I don't care. Ya juz barfed all over my chores."

Leonardo only closed his eyes and leaned his head into the cushion of the old couch, ignoring his brothers.

Raph reached for the remote and started flicking for anything to watch, while Michelangelo stared at his sick brother. He carefully approached the couch, making sure not to make any contact with Leo and slowly sat down on the far end of the couch, right next to Raph.

"Mike, get offa' me," Raph pushed his brother away, causing Leo to open his eyes. "I don't want ye in my lap!"

Mikey flew up from the couch to avoid touching Leo. "But what if it's ca--"

"It's _not_ catchin', dammit," Raph cut him off, rolling his eyes and looking back at the TV.

Mike carefully studied Leo, as if he carried the Ebola virus, before he slowly sat back down on the couch, making sure he wasn't touching his brother.

Leo tiredly glared at the youngest turtle for a second before he closed his eyes and leaned back against the couch, rubbing his stomach.

The next few minutes were spent in silence. Raphael was still channel surfing, never stopping at a channel for more than half a second and Leo was half asleep on the couch, while Mikey still stared at him, a look of disgust plastered on his face.

_It's not catching, it's not catching, it's not catching_, the hypochondriac repeated to himself in his mind, while trying not to breathe in the air Leo exhaled.

The three of them remained like this for a while, until Raph suddenly got a weird look on his face and got up from the armrest.

"What's the matter, bro?" Mikey asked, turning to look at his other brother, who didn't look very well. "You all right?" he wondered, his features twisting with concern.

Without a single word spoken, Raph took off to the bathroom, swiftly lifting up the toilet lid before he leaned in to empty his stomach.

The vomiting noises caused Mike to jump up from the couch, moving as far away from Leonardo as he could.

Leo only sighed and got up from the couch, his arms wrapped around himself as he followed Raphael.

"Stay away from me!" Mikey warned and pointed at Leo with an unsteady finger, backing his shell up against the kitchen sub-car.

Leo only ignored his panicked sibling and peeked inside the bathroom where Raphael still did his business. "I thought we weren't suppose to throw up on your chores," the oldest said with a smile, only to earn the finger from his doubled over brother.

* * *

Donatello sat up in his bed and tiredly rubbed his eyes. He had gone to bed not long after cleaning up after breakfast and, glancing at the clock on the bedside table next to him, he realized he had slept all the way to 2:13 pm. Getting up so early to prepare breakfast was starting to get to him.

He yawned sleepily before he got to his feet and scratched himself on his left thigh, realizing that he had to go and empty his bladder. Then, while still feeling half asleep, he opened his sub-car doors and stepped out into the living room, where things had changed a little bit since before he went to bed.

Raphael and Leonardo sat on each end of the couch, both of them wrapped in blankets, with pathetic looks on their faces. Mikey sat on the floor, with his 'Spiderman' pillow under him, watching TV at a safe distance from the other two.

"What happened to_ you_ guys?" Don asked, getting all of their attention as he stepped out of his room.

"Don't look at them!" Mikey cried, reaching out his arms towards Donnie for a more powerful effect. "They're catching!"

"I'm sorry.. what?" Don asked, his eyes narrowing in confusion.

"Don't lissen ta 'im," Raph muttered, pulling his blanked closer to his face. "He's been like this eva' since Leo threw up."

"Threw up?" Don questioned, his face losing some of its color.

"Oh, not you too..." Leo mumbled, leaning his head back into the couch. "So we threw up - big deal. It's not the end of the world."

Donnie remained by the sub-car, looking at the two on the couch. "Um.. when y-you... threw up. Did you do it in a bucket, or.."

"Whattahell do ya think?" Raph spat, sitting up. "We did it in _there_." He pointed towards the bathroom sub-car.

"Y-you did it in the toilet?" Don paled even more, thinking about all the germs they left behind. How was he supposed to go tinky winky _now_?

"Well, it's not like we had time to fill up a bucket of water," Leo defended their actions, pulling his blanket tighter around himself. Raphael nodded in agreement.

Donatello took a deep breath to calm himself down. After he'd done so he looked back at his contagious brothers. "When did you.. um... start feeling sick?" he asked.

Leo and Raph glanced at each other before turning back to Don. "Some time after lunch," Leo said.

Don's eyes narrowed and his voice became more serious. "What did you have for lunch?"

"Chicken," Leo answered, getting a confused look on his face. "Why?"

"_Mikey_'s chicken?" Donnie questioned, glancing at his little brother on the floor.

"Yeah," Raph answered, his features tensing. "Don, where ya getting at?"

Donatello ignored his red masked brother and turned to Michelangelo. "Mikey, how'd you prepare the chicken?" Mike stared at his brother in confusion. "It's real important that you tell me," Don urged.

Mikey scratched himself on his arm, a little taken aback by his older brother's seriousness. "Um.. I boiled it.. why? Did I do something wrong?"

Donatello turned back to the other two, who looked even more confused. "You might suffer from food poisoning," he finally said, causing Raph and Leo to turn to the youngest turtle with angry looks on their faces.

"Ya gave us _food_ _poisonin'_?" Raph blew up, looking a tad upset.

"What?" Mikey exclaimed in shock, before quickly turning to look at his pissed off brothers. "C'mon guys, I didn't poison you." He held up his arms in defence. "Leo's the bad cook, remember?"

Unfortunately for Mikey, the comment only made Leo angrier. "When I get my hands on you..." he growled, sitting up properly.

"No, c'mon, I bet there's some mistake.. Right, Donnie?" Mike turned to the purple dressed turtle, who still stood outside of his room.

"Well, maybe," Donnie admitted, much to Michelangelo's relief. "If it's food poisoning, then _all_ of you have to get sick, and unless you don't feel like throwing up.."

"I don't," Mikey quickly chirped. Truth was he had felt a little nauseous, but he figured it was only his imagination playing tricks on his stomach. After all, it hadn't started until he saw Leo throw up.

"How's Sensei feeling?" Don asked his older brothers.

"Last time I checked he was fine," Leo answered, before realizing something and turning back to Mikey. "Then again, he didn't _eat_ the chicken, _did_ he?"

Mike smile nervously and pushed himself backwards, retreating slowly across the floor with his pillow underneath him.

"Why not?" Donatello wondered, still looking at Leo.

"He ate the sushi April got for him," Leo explained, causing Donnie to nod a the memory of bringing home the raw fish the night before, when he picked up the supplies.

"Okay." Donatello nodded, relived to hear that his father was all right. "But just in case it's _not_ food poisoning, you two should probably keep your distance from him. At least until we know for sure."

"An' when's that?" Raph asked, impatiently.

"We'll know for certain if Mikey pukes," Don said, causing the three to turn and look at Michelangelo on the floor.

Mike smiled nervously as he felt his stomach come to life, suppressing the feeling for the sake of his survival. If he threw up - his brothers would go berserk on him.

* * *

An hour later, Leo was back in front of the toilet, throwing up whatever he had left inside of him. Raph sat occupied on the couch, while Mikey still sat on his 'Spiderman' pillow in front of the TV. His stomach cramps came and went every few minutes, and every time either of his brothers went to the bathroom to throw up, his own need to barf became even greater. But for the safety of his own neck, Mike had to suppress the urge to vomit and sit on the floor as if nothing was wrong, something that was particularly hard when the oldest turtle was in the bathroom; making hulking sounds.

Raphael, with his blanket rolled up around him, making him look like a caterpillar, looked up from the couch as Leo exited the bathroom. "How'd it go?"

"I don't think there's much left in my stomach anymore.." Leo mumbled, his forehead dropping with sweat.

"Yeah?" Raphael feverishly lit up. "Ye got ta the part where there's juz this weird mucus comin' outta ya when ya barf?" he wondered, leaving room for his older brother as he sat down.

Michelangelo felt his stomach turn at his brothers' discussion. People exchanging their upchucking experiences wasn't really what he needed when he tried to hold his food down.

"Yeah... kind of bubbly," Leo confirmed with a tired nod as he reached for his brown blanket and pulled it around himself. "Although there _was_ still some rice left," he added and turned to Raphael. "Not that it looked much like rice anymore."

That sentence was too much for Mikey to handle and he uncontrollably retched onto the platform floor, the vomit shooting out of his mouth like a catapult. He quickly clutched his mouth with his hands, in an attempt to stop the next load that swirled in his stomach. Leonardo and Raph instantly turned their attention to their youngest sibling, taking in the image of his recent work.

"My floor!" Leo shrieked, grabbing onto his head in despair. "You've ruined my floor!"

"An' ye poisoned us!" Raphael added, angrily boring his eyes into Mikey's.

Mike however had more urgent things to attend to and flew up from the floor, his hand covering his mouth as he ran across the living room to the bathroom carriage. Unfortunately he didn't make it there in time and emptied parts of his lunch on the bathroom floor.

Raphael's superpower-ears immediately picked up on the sound and rose from the couch, stumbling towards the bathroom with his blanket wrapped around his shoulders. _"MIKEY!"_ he roared as he discovered the mess on the floor; pieces of chicken along with rice and a puddle of unidentified fluid, possibly milk mixed with stomach acid. "I'll fuckin' snap yer neck!"

Donatello, who had been in his room; working with his soon to be TV, left his sub-car and hurried up to Raph, holding his arms from behind him to keep him from hurling at Mikey. "Calm down, Raph!" Don urged, locking his hot headed brother's arms behind his shell.

_"Calm down!"_ Raph outburst, trying to break free from his younger brother's grip. "Look what he's done ta the bathroom! I swear I'll kill 'im!"

"Not without stepping in his vomit, you won't," Don pointed out, finally earning Raph's attention.

The furious turtle calmed down a bit, the smell from the puddle in front of him bringing him back to reality. He pulled himself away from Donatello and went back to the couch, angrily sitting down next to Leo, who had a mute look on his face. "What?" Raph snapped, turning to look at his blue masked brother.

Leo quickly held up his hands in defence, proving that he didn't want to fight. It was enough for Raphael to leave him alone and turn back to the television, where some shampoo commercial was on.

Donatello carefully picked up the blanket Raph had dropped in the turmoil, not making any more contact with the fabric than what was necessary. After all, there could be vomit germs all over it, which was the reason Don hadn't used the bathroom yet, even though his bladder had been pushing ever since he woke up. He left Mikey alone to his upchucking business and walked over to his other siblings, dropping the blanket onto Raph's lap from behind the back of the couch.

"You dropped this," he said, quickly wiping off his hands on his thighs, just in case he had been infected.

Raph clutched the blanket and pulled it around him, trying to make himself comfortable on the couch, as his fever started to kick in again, from the sudden tantrum he had.

Don silently went to kitchen to wash his hands clean. But even as he passed his two siblings on the way back to his room, he still brushed his hands against his thighs. Just to make _sure_ he wouldn't be infected.

Not long after that, Mikey came out from the bathroom, carrying a bucket of water in his right grip.

"Oh ye _betta'_ clean up in there!" Raph threatened, glaring with his feverish eyes.

"I did," Mike replied, bending down to wipe up the mess he left on the living room floor. After he was done he went back inside the bathroom to empty the bucket in the toilet.

Donnie came out into the living room, a medical encyclopaedia held open in his hands. "You might wanna listen to this," he said, earning his brothers' attention.

Mikey soon came out of the bathroom, sitting back down on his pillow, sensing his brothers didn't want him on the couch with them.

"Ya gonna diagnose us?" Raph said pessimistically, pulling his blanket closer around him.

Donatello ignored Raphael's comment and rested his eyes on a particular paragraph of the text. "Food poisoning is the result of eating organisms or toxins in contaminated food. Most cases of food poisoning are from common bacteria like Staphylococcus or E. coli." He glanced up at his brothers, whom he'd lost at the first medical term. Ignoring this, he looked down on the page and continued reading. "At least one out of five Americans suffer food poisoning each year, and over nine thousand deaths are reported as a result."

"I'm gonna _die_?" Mikey shrieked, frantically checking his forehead temperature.

Leo sighed and gestured for Don to go on.

"Food usually becomes contaminated with these agents from poor sanitation or preparation. Food handlers who do not wash their hands after using the bathroom or have infections themselves often cause contamination. Improperly packaged food stored at the wrong temperature also promotes contamination."

Leonardo and Raphael turned to look at Mikey. "Ye didn't _wash_ yer _hands_, pinhead?" Raph growled, angrily squinting his eyes.

"I did too," Mike defended himself. "It's not _my_ fault the food dudes aren't sanitary."

"Wait," Don said, holding up his index finger while still looking at the open page in the book. "I think this is it," he told them, pointing his finger at a certain part in the text, sliding it across the page while reading. "_Staphylococcal food poisoning:_ Staphylococcus aureus survives when refrigerated, although it does not multiply. The bacteria is destroyed by pasteurisation of milk and cooking of food, but the toxin may survive these processes. The main foods associated with illness are cooked meats, poultry and foods which are handled during preparation without subsequent cooking."

"So what does that mean?" Raph asked, the others looking just as confused as he felt.

Don shook his head in disbelief, wondering why there weren't any bright crayons in their box apart from himself. "It means that Mikey probably didn't boil the chicken long enough for the bacteria to die."

The three turtles turned their attention to the youngest family member, sitting on top of his 'Spiderman' pillow.

"Oh," Mikey realized, blushing slightly at the news. "Sorry, dudes," he sheepishly apologized.

Donatello returned his focus to the book and continued to read. "This type of food poisoning is associated with abdominal cramps, fever, vomiting and diarrhea. Symptoms can appear between two to about six hours after eating food contaminated with an enterotoxin formed by the staph bacteria."

"Wait?" Leo interrupted, a worried look on his face. "Dia-_rrhea_?" he repeated, his features twisting in fear. The other two infected worriedly rubbed their stomachs, fearing what was to come.

"Yeah," Donnie confirmed, his face lowered to the book. "And it says _here_ that the only cure is lots and lots of water, to avoid dehydration and that it should pass on its own in a couple of days. Oh!" he added, pointing at the page. "And drinking milk will only worsen the diarrhea. And you shouldn't have dairy products or anything solid until it's passed." With that explained, Don closed up the book, looking at his siblings.

"Soo..." Raph trailed, a blank look in his face. "In English that means...?"

"Basically," Don answered, this time speaking in small words so his brothers would understand. "Drink lots of water, don't eat anything you have to chew and stay as far away from me as possible."

"Wait.." Mikey reacted to the last part and pointed at the book. "It didn't say that."

"No," Don agreed. "But _I_ am. I don't want diarrhea and stomach cramps."

"But I thought food poisonin' didn't catch?" Raph interjected, looking at Leo for support.

"It doesn't," Donatello confirmed. "But there's always a chance it's _not_ food poisoning, so just keep your distance. Because I don't want any part of this disease." He felt his bladder waking up again, having cooled down when he'd been reading.

"So what about the bathroom?" Leo wondered, knowing that if there were any bacteria anywhere, _that_ would be the place.

"Yeah," Mikey agreed, smiling tiredly. "Are ya putting your number one's and two's on strike?" The three upchuckers sniggered evilly.

"Maybe.." Don said, feeling like he wanted to cross his legs together to strangle his bladder.

* * *

Donatello sat in his room, trying to ignore his need to go pee by soldering together some wires inside the TV set he found on the junkyard a few days earlier. However, his urge grew stronger and his focus thinner, until a sudden voice at the door jinxed his concentration.

"Donnie?"

Don dropped the soldering-iron onto his thumb, burning a nice little mark into his green skin. "Ow!" Don shrieked, sticking his thumb in his mouth and looking up at the doorway. "What is it?" he asked, causing Michelangelo to take a step inside the room.

_"Noo!"_ Don screamed, holding out his arms to stop Mike.

Mikey froze in shock, afraid he was about to step on something important. "What?" he asked, his foot hovering above the ground, while at the sime time trying to hold onto the blanket that threatened to slid off his shoulders.

"Don't touch anything!" Don said, getting up from his desk chair. "I don't wanna get sick!"

Mikey instantly relaxed, putting his food down onto the floor. "Geez, Don. I thought I was gonna kill something." He pulled the blanket closer around himself.

"No!" Don forbid, waving with his arms in panic. "Get out, get out! No touching!"

"Okay, okay, bro," Mikey said, holding upa hand to prove that he meant no harm. "Take it easy. I was just gonna ask you where you put the orange juice."

"Fine, I'll show you," Donnie promised, walking up to leave the sub-car. "Just _don't_ touch anything."

Mikey left the carriage with Donatello walking a safe distance behind him, earning an odd look from the other two turtles as they went by them on their way to the kitchen. Don carefully passed Michelangelo in a wide half circle, keeping his arms at his sides to avoid touching. When standing by the kitchen cabinets, he hesitantly opened the larder, while keeping an eye on his sick brother.

"Here," Donnie said, holding out the tiny box of concentrated orange juice.

Mikey, being the clown he was, couldn't of course help himself from messing with his brother and evilly greased his fingers across Don's hand as he reached out to grab the juice. "Germs, germs!" he taunted, before Don quickly pulled back his hand and stared at it as if was a roadkilled squirrel, completely freaked out.

"Mikey!" Don squealed, holding his hand a safe distance from himself. "You little fiend!" He quickly rushed up to the sink to wash himself clean, obsessively scrubbing his hand with washing-up liquid. "What if I get sick?" he glanced at Mikey before turning the water a little hotter to be on the safe side.

"C'mon, dude," Mikey waved him off, holding onto his blanket with his other hand. "I was only messing with ya."

"Yeah well, from now on - don't," Don said firmly, almost burning his hand under the hot water.

Mikey only smiled as he reached inside one of the cupboards for a pitcher to blend the juice in.

* * *

After had been watching infomercial for forty five minutes, Raph felt it was time to sacrifice some more food to the porcelain God. He took off his blanket and rose from the couch, stepping over Michelangelo's legs that rested on the coffee table, from where he sat in Splinter's chair. After the fever had gotten to him, Leo and Raph finally made it clear for him to come off the floor, although they didn't want him snuggled up next to them on the couch, so naturally he got the chair.

The sick turtle got a hot flash from standing up and stumbled towards the bathroom. As he entered the sub-car and got down on his knees in front of the toilet, he tiredly laid his head on the porcelain ring, waiting for his stomach muscles to do the job. When lying there, his eyes resting on the bathroom floor, he spotted drops of vomit around the toilet seat, causing his blood to boil.

"The hell?" he muttered, lifting his head to yell over his shoulder. "Ya could at least honk _in_ the toilet!" he called to the others, before putting his tired head back down. Although, lying there in wait, he realized his body wanted to do something else, as he felt a worrying sensation taking form at the other end of his body.

_Diarrhea_, Raph fearfully realized, recalling the nasty diagnose Don had given them. He quickly got up from the floor and pulled the plastic ring down, seating himself for the job.

"Would you hurry up in there!" Leo's voice yelled from the living room. "I think I'm gonna be sick again!"

"Ya juz wait yer turn, a'right!" Raphael called back, instantly regretting he hadn't had enough time to close the door. "Geez.." he muttered to himself, realizing there weren't enough room in his family to even suffer the woes of food poisoning in peace.

* * *

Donatello still sat in his room, trying to figure out which wire in the TV set that wasn't working. Although the tickling feeling in his bladder didn't do much to help. He had even aborted his work a couple of times; getting up from his chair to do a little can't-pee-my-shell dance around the room. But he felt like his bladder was only growing bigger and he feared another dance would only open the gates. He persistently put one of his legs over the other, closing them together tightly to make the feeling go away.

But it was getting harder.

Only, he couldn't go to the bathroom. He just _couldn't._

Because while sitting there in his room, abusing his bladder, he had pictured so many places showered with bacteria. Not just the toilet. So even if he washed his hands with acid, which in spite of his high intelligence had crossed his mind a couple of times, he wouldn't come out safe.

It was too big of a risk to go in there.

However, his bladder told him otherwise, creeping closer to the emergency exit of his body.

* * *

At the same time in the living room, the three Blanketeers (blanket-teers) were on their second hour of infomercial shopping. Mikey had actually liked the teeth whitening set, that brightened your teeth in the miraculous time of thirty seconds. But he had quickly been overpowered by his two brothers when he'd gotten up from his chair to dial to phone number on the screen.

Now, they were watching a commercial about loosing weight by using this machine that had you doing exercises lying down on the floor. Basically, sit-ups, only _this_ _time_ you had to pay the _incredible_ price of _thirty nine dollars_ and _ninety nine cents_. And not only _that_! But if you called within thetime of _ten minutes_, then you _also_ got this _video tape_, instructing you how to run a mile in your _own_ living room. And the _best_ part was! It was all small enough to fit _right_ under your _bed_!

"How are you feeling, my sons?"

The three fever-struck turtles turned their heads from the hypnotizing television to their Sensei, who had dared himself out of his room, in spite of Donatello's paranoid warnings about how the terrible disease was gonna get them all!

"Not so good," Mikey said, instantly going into near-death mode, as his father was present. "I feel like I'm burning up. And my stomach's cramping all the time." He pulled out his hands from underneath his blanket and clutched his plastron for a more powerful effect.

Splinter gave his youngest son a comforting smile, although he could easily see through his fake act. "Where is Donatello?" he asked and turned to his other two sons on the couch.

Just as Leo was about to answer, the doors to Don's sub-car flew open, with Donatello himself bursting out of there. With his hands pressed to his groin he sprinted past them, his panicked legs moving rather oddly, making him look like a scared pansy.

Donnie quickly climbed the exit ladder, leaving his family flabbergasted behind him, as he rushed down a sewer tunnel to finally do what his bladder had been begging for ever since he woke up - pee-pee.


	11. What's that smell?

**Chapter 11 - "What's that smell?"**

Michelangelo brought out the cutting board from one of the bottom kitchen drawers and placed it on the counter, sighing as a stern Leonardo approached from behind him and peered over his shoulder.

"You're not gonna prepare the food on that, are you?" Leo questioned, still scarred from the food poisoning six days ago.

"Well.." Mike trailed, taking a step to the left to get some distance between him and his big brother. "Yeah, I kinda am. Why?"

Leo grunted in disapproval, casting a glance at Raphael who stood leaned against the dining table. "Haven't you listened to _anything_ we've told you? Always. Wash. The cutting board," Leo ranted, repeatedly slamming his hand into his palm to emphasize his point.

"Fine," Mikey caved, taking three annoyed steps to the sink to turn on the water. "I don't see why you have to be on my back about it. I said I was sorry!"

"Yeah well, that didn't do much for me when I was barfin' from both ends," Raphael sneered, crossing his arms at the memory. "An' not only did I hafta spend two days with my head down the toilet - I had ta _wait in line_ ta even get _in_ there! So s'cuse us for making ya clean the kitchen supplies!"

"Exactly," Leo stepped in, nodding his head in agreement. "We're not taking any more chances when it comes to you and your cooking. Did you know that there are far more bacteria in the kitchen than what there is in the bathroom? And that most of the germs hide in the dish towels? I mean, only by being cautious when you're cooking, you're improving you're chances of not getting sick by eighty-five percent." Leo finished, practically quoting the book 'Where the germs hide', which he'd borrowed from Donatello to read when he was sick.

Mike shook his head as he scrubbed the plastic board in the sink, once in a while saying something like 'you don't say' or 'who knew?' to make Leo think he was listening to his speech.

"I read about this research where they checked an average family's kitchen for five days, only to find that it was heavily contaminated. But," Leo said, holding up his index finger. "On the _sixth_ day, the bacteria count had dropped to practically nothing. Do you know why?" He asked and turned to Raphael, who only sent him a 'If you think I'll answer that, you're dumber than I thought' look.

Leo turned the question to Mikey, realizing Raph wasn't interested in his book. Especially not after he'd read it out loud to him when they had shared the living room couch during the bathroom plague. "Mikey? Do _you_ know why?"

"How interesting," Mike mumbled, totally unaware of the fact the Leo had asked him a question.

"Mikey?" Leo narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "Are you even listening to what I'm saying?"

"That's so fascinating," Mike said, completely clueless to Leonardo's question.

"Mikey!" Leo snapped, causing Mike to jump in fright. "You haven't heard a word I've said. When are you _ever_ going to learn from your mistakes?" Leo scolded, moving on to another speech.

Mike secretly imitated his brother's ranting, making nagging faces while washing the cutting board.

"...and for you to actually complain when we're supervising you in the kitchen," Leo continued, talking to deaf ears. "When you _clearly_ haven't learned anything from all of this for us to trust you.." Leo paused, noticing Raphael grinning in the corner of his eye. He sent a questioning look his red clad brother's way, who only pointed at Mikey in response. Leo soon understood what had been so funny.

"Would you stop that!" Leo snapped, putting his hands on his hips in disapproval.

Mike turned off the tap and turned back to his brothers with an innocent smile on his face. "What?" he asked, acting like he had no idea what Leonardo was talking about.

"Do you think I'm stupid or something?" Leo asked, raising his eyebrows expectantly.

"Leo," Raph said, shaking his head in disappointment. "_Neva_' leave yerself open like that."

Leonardo frowned, turning back to Mikey to continue where he left off, but doing so he noticed the clock on the wall. "Oh no," he said, tensing a little. "I'm gonna be late."

"For what?" Raphael wondered, getting up from his leaned in position.

"For meeting April," Leo explained, turning around to his brother in a hurry. "I have to go," he said and rushed to leave the kitchen. But then he remembered something and turned around in the doorway, looking at the red masked turtle. "Will you make sure Donnie cover for me?"

"Sure," Raph nodded. "I'll go get 'im." With that, the two oldest brothers left the kitchen; Leo heading out the entrance while Raphael stomped off for reinforcement. A few moments later, he came back inside the kitchen with Donatello walking behind him.

"Have you washed those?" Don asked as he noticed Mike by the counter, preparing to chop up the sweet pepper.

"Yes," Mike said, cutting the green vegetable on the middle. "And I've washed the board," he continued. "_And_ my hands," he added, as Donatello was about to ask him.

"Good," Donnie approved, stepping up next to him, while Raphael leaned back against the dining table again. "So what are you preparing?" he wondered, looking at the vegetables on the counter.

"Tacos," Michelangelo answered, chopping up the sweet pepper like one would chop wood.

Don opened one of the bottom cabinets for a cooking book, looking up the recipe in question. He carefully looked over the page before turning back to Mikey. "It says _here_ that you should start with the minced meat," he explained and pointed to the open page in the book.

"Dude, I don't think it matters," Mike shrugged, chopping up a cucumber.

"Dude," Donnie echoed, imitating his younger brother. "I think it does. Turn on the stove and get the frying pan," he ordered, making sure his little brother followed the recipe properly.

"Fine," Mikey sighed and put down the kitchen knife. He went over to one of the bottom cabinets and got the frying pan, which he placed on top of the stove. When waiting for the pan to heat up, Raphael suggested he could clean up in the kitchen.

Mike obeyed and went over to the sink to fetch the wash towel, turning on the tap to drench it.

"Wait," Don said, holding out a hand to stop his brother. "Do you know the amount of bacteria that resides in that thing?" he questioned, earning a sigh from both of his brothers.

"Seriously," Raphael grunted. "We've already had Leo quoting that stupid book. I ain't puttin' up with you, too."

"Well, he was right," Donatello insisted, carefully grabbing the wash cloth from Michelangelo, holing it in between his thumb and index finger. "If you wanna be sure there aren't any bacteria left," he continued, walking through the kitchen sub-car. "You have to microwave it." He put the towel in their microwave and set the time on thirty seconds, explaining the importance of ridding the kitchen of all the evil germs while waiting for the thirty seconds to pass. Once done, the machine beeped and Don brought out a very hot, yet very healthy dish cloth. He handed it back to Mikey, along with his blessing to use it.

"Finally," Mike said impatiently, drenching the cloth before cleaning the sink and counter. When he was finished, the frying pan was hot enough to use, so after being strictly reminded to wash his hands by his two older brothers, he dumped the minced meat into the pan, stirring it up with a wooden fork, one that Don had insisted they'd microwave.

When Mike was frying up the meat and playing with the giant fork in the frying pan, Donatello and Raphael had him under close surveillance, studying the meat closely.

"There's still a spot there that isn't done," Donnie said, pointing at a certain part of the meat that didn't look as brown as the rest of it.

Mike pressed it down to the surface of the pan with his fork, rolling his eyes at his brother's remark.

"What about that?" Raph added, pointing at another part that was still red a raw.

"Y'know," Mike said, drying off his greasy forehead with the back of his left hand. "You've been babysitting my cooking for days now. I think I'll be able to take it from here."

"NO!" His brothers forbid in unison.

* * *

Leonardo wandered through the damp tunnels with April strolling next to him. Usually she didn't need escort when visiting them. Because at night when her visits usually took place, there weren't that many people around - meaning; she could take a different way. But during the day she had to sneak down the sewers through an alley, where the manhole cover was much to heavy for her to budge. Therefor Leo met her in that alley to help her with the lifting.

They had been walking for twenty minutes and weren't that far away from the lair when April suddenly stopped, twisting her face in disgust. "What's that smell?" she asked, sniffing loudly to identify it.

"What smell?" Leonardo asked, his sense of smell a little off since after he got sick.

"You don't smell that?" April wondered, looking at Leo, who only shook his head in response. "It smells... funny," she said, trying to describe it to him.

"Well," Leo said, giving up on trying to smell it. "We're _in_ the sewers. This place isn't exactly known for smelling like roses."

April playfully slapped him on the arm, making a face at him. "I know that, Leo," she said, sniffing the air once again. "But this... this smells different. Worse." She walked further down the tunnel, trying to make out where the stench was coming from. She made a right turn into another tunnel and stopped in her tracks. "Um.. Leo?" she called after him, covering her nose in disgust.

"What?" Leo wondered, walking after her. " What is it?" When arriving in the tunnel next to her, his face fell. There was a huge mountain of garbage bags on the side of the tunnel, some of the bags about to fall into the water.

"I can't believe how careless people can be," April mumbled, still pinching her nose.

"I know," Leo agreed, walking up to the pile to inspect it further. "Who would actually come down here and dump all of this?" he wondered, stopping right in front of the mountain. His eyes travelled over the see-through bags, inspecting the thrash inside them.

_Milk cartons, an empty tube of tooth paste, paper towels, kitty litter..._

Leo stopped in his thoughts, knowing where he had seen the last thing on the list. And coming to think of it, the rest of the trash seemed just as familiar.

"This is _our_ garbage," he realized, taking a step back and turning around to April.

"What?" April questioned, her eyebrows rising in confusion. "But I thought Donnie took care of your garbage..?"

Leo's face twisted in anger, a bitter realization hitting him. "So did I.." he growled, stomping out of the tunnel.

* * *

"I can't believe he would actually dump all our trash in the sewer," Leo said, climbing down the exit ladder to the lair.

"Well, it doesn't really sound like something he'd do," April agreed, climbing down after him. "Just don't tell anything to Splinter until you've talked to Donnie about it first," she said, jumping off the ladder. "There might be a reasonable explanation for all of this."

"Yeah," Leo replied, shaking his head as he descended the stairway leading down to the platform. "He's too lazy to go to the dump."

"Well, maybe there's another reason," April insisted, following behind him. "Just don't rat on him until you've at least talked to him," she said, putting a hand on his upper arm to stop him.

Leo stopped at the bottom of the steps, letting out a deep breath. "Fine," he surrendered. "I won't say anything until I've asked Don about it."

April smiled, patting him on the arm. Then, as she followed down the steps after him, she noticed the number of dead leaves underneath the plant at the bottom of the steps. "What happened to that?" she asked, pointing at the not-so-green plant.

"Hmm?" Leo questioned, turning around to look at her. "Oh, that," he realized when spotting the plant. "Yeah, that's Mikey's doing. He's been watering the plants."

"He's been playing hooky, huh?" April said, biting her lip at the thought.

"No actually, he's been a little too enthusiastic with the flowers," Leonardo explained.

"Oh," April said, not really knowing what to say.

"So, are you ready for lunch?" Leo asked, smiling a little. "Mikey made tacos. Normally I wouldn't eat anything he cooked, but I think it's safe this time," he said, walking off towards the kitchen sub-car.

"_This_ time?" April questioned, worriedly walking after him.

* * *

Mikey led April to the empty seat at the table, pulling out the chair for her.

"Thank you," April said, sitting down with his assistance, smiling at Raphael across from her. "So I heard you made tacos?" She turned back to Mike, who brought the hot taco shells out of the microwave and put them on the table, with the rest of the food.

"Yeah," Michelangelo confirmed, taking the seat in between Donatello and April. "There's nothing like tacos for Sunday lunch," he said as he reached across the table for a shell.

"We have to wait for Master Splinter," Leo scolded, staring at Mike from across the table.

"Right.." Mike agreed, dropping the shell back among the rest of them. He brought his hands back to himself and rested his eyes on the food, rolling his thumbs in anticipation.

Luckily he didn't have to wait that long, for only a few seconds later the old rat entered the kitchen, carrying another dead plant in his hand. One that only had five leaves left, including the one that fell onto the kitchen floor as he carried it. Splinter bent over to pick up the yellow leaf and got back up on his feet; leaning on his cane. He walked up to the trash cabinet and dropped his dear plant into the trash bin, sadly closing the cupboard after him.

Leo looked apologetically at his father, knowing how much his flowers meant to him. "I'm sorry, Master," he said, pulling out the chair next to him for his mentor to sit.

"So am I," Splinter replied, leaning his cane against the table and seating himself.

"How many are there left?" Donatello wondered, trying to remember how many flowers he had thrown out.

"That was the fifth one," Splinter replied, looking from his son to the set dining table. "Ah, and what do you call this meal?" he asked curiously.

"They're tacos," Michelangelo answered with a broad smile, happy to be changing the subject from his flower murdering spree. "Or as I'd like to call it - Tacos a' la Mikey. Dig in," he said, holding out the plate of taco shells to his father.

Splinter nodded and accepted a shell, looking at it with great confusion as the rest of them served themselves. "And how exactly do you have this meal?" he wondered, still holding the yellow shell in his paw.

"Oh.." Mike realized, looking back at his Sensei. "Well, first you pick out the things you wanna fill it with. In my case lots and lots of meat," he said as he dumped several spoons of minced meat onto his shell, a lot of it falling down onto his plate. "Also, you can't have tacos without sweet pepper," he added, stuffing the shell with different kinds of paprika. After Michelangelo was done with his highly overpopulated shell, he bit into it; the vegetables dropping onto his plate and the grease sliding down his arms. "And that's how you do it," he finished, cucumber bits spitting out from his crowded mouth.

Splinter nodded slightly, staring at his pig of a son.

"Here, Master," Leo said, offering a hand to his father. "I'll help you." Splinter handed his taco to his oldest son and allowed him to pick out the things he thought he wanted, handing back a perfectly filled shell.

"Thank you," Splinter said, nodding in appreciation.

"So," April said, after she had swallowed a mouthful of tacos. "How's it been going with the chores?"

A strange silence fell over the dining table, each turtle looking down at their plate.

"What?" April questioned, the shell gripped in her right hand. "Did something happen?" Her eyes darted in between her friends.

"Let's just say you're very lucky Raph and I supervised Mikey when he made lunch," Donatello finally answered, Leo and Raphael nodding in agreement.

"What?" April asked, not knowing about the little chicken incident. "What are you talking about?"

"Mike food poisoned us," Raph revealed, causing April to drop her taco in fright.

"He did _what_?" she questioned, turning to look at the turtle in question. "You did?"

"Well, it's not like I did it on purpose," Mike defended himself. "According to some book Leo's been reading, it's very common with chicken."

"Well yeah," Leo agreed, knowing the book by heart. "But even so you won't be doing anything alone in this kitchen. I'm not going through that horrible experience again - ever."

"Amen," Don agreed, filling up another tacos shell.

Raphael pessimistically turned to Donatello. "You weren't even sick," he pointed out.

"Well... yeah." Donnie nodded, looking up at his friends. "Nevertheless I'm not living through it again. I didn't even dare myself to go to the bathroom until yesterday."

"Wait," Mikey interrupted, his mouth stuffed with food. "If you didn't go to the bathroom, where did ya do your number one's and two--" He suddenly stopped, realizing something to himself. _"Eiuuu!"_ he whined, dropping his taco in disgust. "You _crapped_ in the _sewers_?"

Donnie's green face turned a deeper shade, looking down in embarrassment.

"Dude, remind me to never go out _there_ again," Mikey said, his face twisting in disgust.

Once talking about the sewer and the things that hid out there, Leonardo remembered the mountain of garbage he and April found, not that far from the den. He angrily glared at his brother in purple, who looked up when his face had returned to its natural color. He noticed his oldest brother staring at him and instantly grew worried because of it.

"Leo?" Donnie asked, lifting up his glass of milk to drink. "What's the matter?"

Leo caught April's glance from the other side of the table, knowing what he promised. "Nothing," he mumbled and looked down to his plate.

Don shared a confused look with Michelangelo, who only shrugged his shoulders in response. He put his glass back down and turned back to the Fearless leader. "Leo, if you're mad at me about something, you can tell me," he insisted, searching eye contact with his oldest brother, who did his best to ignore him. "Did I do something?" he continued, searching for his brother's lowered eyes.

"Leonardo," Splinter said, putting down his taco to the plate. "If you are upset with your brother in some way, please tell him."

The turtle in blue looked up at his mentor sitting on his left, contemplating on what to do.

"Leo?" Donnie pushed, a look of pure innocence on his face, one that only infuriated the oldest turtle. Because he knew his brother was anything but innocent.

"Why did you dump all our garbage down one of the tunnels?"

There was a number of gasps heard at the table, everyone turning to look at the recently busted turtle.

"Is this true, Donatello?" Splinter asked, boring his eyes into his son.

"Um... well.." Donnie stuttered, not sure on how to explain himself. "Yeah... sort of.. kinda is."

Leo started at his brother, not letting him off the hook. "Did you or did you not dump the garbage there?" he asked, folding his hands in front of him on the table.

"Okay I did," Donnie admitted, worriedly glancing at his master. "I'm sorry."

Splinter sighed. "My son," he said, earning Don's attention. "I am sure you know the importance of keeping our environment clean, even if it is the sewers. With such careless behaviour comes disease and sickness."

"I know," Don replied, looking incredibly shameful. "It's just... I was so tired of walking back and forth to the city dump. I know I shouldn't have done it. I'm sorry." He lowered his head in shame.

"I understand that you got tired, my son," the old rat said, never taking his eyes off of Donatello. "But you must also remember that the easy way isn't always as simple as it might appear."

Don looked questioningly at his father, not quite understanding what he was talking about.

"After you have finished eating, you will clean up the tunnel and move the waste to where it belongs," the rat finished, his voice still very calm.

"Yes, Master," Donatello obeyed, bowing his head. After that, only silence followed. Everyone at the table secretly glanced at each other while no one really new what to say.

"Can I go?" Raphael suddenly asked, leaning over the table to be able to look at Splinter who sat on the other side of Leonardo.

"Have you finished your lunch?" he old ninja master asked, looking at his red masked son.

"Yeah," Raph said, holding out his empty plate to prove it.

"Then you may leave," Splinter decided, watching his son put the plate in the sink and leave the sub-car.

* * *

While the other still sat in the kitchen, Raphael took advantage of the television, which for once was available. He took the remote from the coffee table at slumped down onto the couch, clicking on the TV while resting his other arm behind his head. He quickly scanned the channels for any good Sunday-television, but after deciding against reality TV-reruns and a very disturbing documentary about wild turtles during the mating season, he decided to turn to an old movie.

He got up from the couch to pick out a movie to watch, his eyes travelling across the many cases of their VHS collection.

* * *

Meanwhile in the kitchen, the small talk had carefully started to build up again, until it finally resembled somewhat of a conversation.

"...and that's when we figured it was food poisoning," Leo finished and looked at Michelangelo, having skipped the less attractive details of the story.

"Wow," April breathed, still a little grossed out in spite of Leo's discreteness. "Looks like you've had a busy week down here."

"To say the least," Donnie said, fiddling with his empty plate, knowing he had to play garbage man soon.

"So..." April trailed, looking at her friends. "I'm taking it the chores aren't going so well..."

The group froze as a furious voice ripped through their home, the source of it still in the linving room.

"YA DIDN'T _REWIND_ THE _TAPES_! OH, YA _BETTA'_ START RUNNIN', MIKEY!"

Splinter tiredly put his glass down by his plate, looking up at the reporter across the table, "One might say that..."


	12. Hide me!

**A/N:** _To every single person that left any kind of print in my review box for this story: Thank You. I hope you enjoyed yourself. However, all good things must come to an end, so I give you the last chapter. Enjoy, and please don't forget to leave a review on your way out._

* * *

**Chapter 12 - "Hide me!"**

Donatello shifted in his chair, carefully looking down the grill of the toaster before he reached for the screwdriver on the left side of the desk, holding onto the desk with one hand as he leaned over to reach with the other.

"Hey!" Raph snapped from where he sat on the mattress, waving with his arm in the air. "Move, will ya? Yer blockin' the tube!"

Don gripped the tool and leaned back in his chair, sighing with his back turned to his two brothers. "Maybe if you hadn't forced that ridiculously large bread slice down the toaster, I wouldn't have to fix it," he said, putting the object upside down to unscrew the bottom screws.

"It ain't my fault they make those slices so damn big," Raphael gruffed, leaning back against the sub-car wall.

"Maybe not," Donnie said, taking out the last couple of screws "_Still doesn't give you right to shove them down our toaster_," he mumbled, his brothers unable to hear what he said. "Besides," he spoke up. "This is my room and you weren't exactly invited."

"Yeah well, we didn't come ta socialize," Raph said, his eyes locked on the television sitting on the left side of the desk. "Not ta break yer heart or anythin', but we're only usin' ya for the TV," he finished, earning a judgmental glare from Leo sitting beside him.

"You don't say.." Don replied, turning around in his chair with the screwdriver still gripped in his right hand. "Kinda figured as much after I installed it and you two suddenly became my best friends."

"We don't come here to bother you, Donnie," Leo jumped in, feeling a little guilty for the way he had behaved the last month. "But it's not like Mikey's giving us much of a choice with his 'Southpark' marathon. Yeah, sure I used to like that show, too... But Kenny dying twenty four-seven? That's just too much for _anyone_ to take."

Don frowned and turned back to the toaster.

"C'mon," Raph teased with a grin. "Don't act like ya don't like our company. You ain't foolin' me, Don."

"Oh no! You're on to me!" Donnie gasped sarcastically, putting a hand to his plastron. "Don't be so full of yourself, Raph," he then said, returning to his normal voice. "You're not _that_ incredible to have around."

"Denial," Raph said simply, waving off his brother's comment before returning to the movie that he and Leonardo were watching.

Suddenly a knock on the closed door interrupted them. They turned their heads to see who it was, while praying it wasn't Mikey that came to show them something 'totally tubulouso they just had to see' on another episode of 'Southpark'. However, they were positively surprised as their Sensei appeared in the doorway.

"I suspected you would be hiding in here," the old rat said, smiling at his three sons, although his smile quickly faded when he discovered the mess on Don's desk. "Donatello," he scolded, turning to his purple clad student. "I am only expecting you to keep your own room clean. Perhaps the four of you need to pick the chores back up to learn a thing or two about cleaning."

"N-no," Donnie stammered, completely panicked as he grabbed for the scattered CD's on his desk. "No, I'll clean this right up," he ensured, piling them up surprisingly fast.

"Good," Splinter approved, turning to look at his other two sons. "What about you?" he asked, raising an eyebrow in suspicion. "Have you cleaned your rooms?"

"Yes," the two of them quickly answered in chorus, exchanging glances of irritation.

"Hmm.." Splinter mused, carefully reading his sons' faces for any signs of lying. "Then you should not mind if I inspect them."

Raph froze, fear obvious on his face. "Maybe I should juz make sure I made the bed," he quickly excused himself and snuck by his father, darting off to his room for some emergency cleaning.

Splinter smiled to himself, turning back to his other son. "I trust you have made your bed, Leonardo," he said, emphasizing the part about having made the bed.

"I have," Leo nodded, no worries hanging over him.

"Good," Splinter approved with a nod. "Then I will be in the kitchen if anyone should need me."

"Yes, Master," the oldest turtle nodded at his father as the old rat turned in the doorway and strode off towards the kitchen sub-car to make himself a cup of tea.

When walking towards the kitchen, Splinter passed his youngest son sprawled on the living room couch, his square shaped eyes glued to the TV. He reached inside the popcorn bowl with one hand while absentmindedly scratching himself on his thigh with the other, not even aware that there was another person in the room. Just as Splinter was about to speak, Michelangelo started laughing at something, amusingly pointing to the TV. The old rat sighed and continued on his path to the kitchen, shaking his head as Mikey suddenly started choking on a popcorn.

_It is only a phase_, Splinter told himself as he left his son alone to spit out the popcorn.

* * *

After shoving anything that might look suspicious into his closet, Raphael returned to the safety of Donatello's room, where the annoying voices of the 'Southpark' citizens couldn't reach. He noticed Don had piled his CD's on his desk, while Leo stood behind him and surveyed the job.

"If you just put this album _here_..." Leonardo suggested, grabbing a CD case and putting it on top of another pile.

"Would you stop it?" Don snapped, snatching the CD from his oldest brother. "I'm not gonna put them in alphabetical order."

"You might as well do it properly if you're gonna sort them out," Leo insisted, grabbing another CD from one of the piles.

"Leave the poor guy alone, will ya, Leo?" Raph said, stepping inside the room and plopping down on Donnie's bed in front of the TV. "One neat freak is more than enough. We don't need anotha' one."

"Gee, Raph," Donnie said, smiling slightly to himself. "I didn't know you cared so much. But you still have my CD's, so if you would just go and get them, that would be great."

"What?" Raph exclaimed, having just gotten comfortable with one of Donatello's pillows. "But I juz got back from there. Can't ya do it yerself? I don't even rememba' which ones I borrowed."

Don frowned, putting down one of his CD cases to the desk. "You borrowed my two 'Scorpions' albums and one 'Queen'," he reminded his brother, causing the third to raise his eye ridges in shock.

"You listen to 'Queen'?" Leo asked and turned around to Raphael on the bed, an amused look on his face.

"So whaddif I do? Ya got a problem with that?" Raph shot back, seemingly a little peeved.

Leo suppressed a smile. "Well, no. I like 'Queen', I just thought they might be a little too..." he paused in search of a proper word, "..._merry_ for your liking."

"Hey!" Raph said, accusingly pointing at his older brother. "They've done some heavier stuff, too, a'right?"

"If you say so.." Leo mumbled, choking a smile that threatened to take him over.

Raphael glared at him for a moment before turning back to the TV, deciding he wouldn't let his big brother get to him.

"What if I get the CD's for you?" Leo suggested to Donatello who perked up at the idea. "With Queenie's permission, of course," he added, turning to Raphael.

Raph only responded by giving him the finger, not even looking away from the television.

"Be my guest," Don said, glancing at Raphael. "You know which albums I'm talking about?"

Leo nodded. "Yeah, probably the only ones that aren't broken."

"That's the ones," Donnie confirmed with a smile, ignoring the glare he received from his red masked brother.

Leo patted Don on the shoulder and left the sub-car to fetch the albums, still smiling over the fact that his macho brother listened to 'Queen'.

Don remained by his desk, still looking at Raphael with a big smile.

"What?" Raph spat, meeting his gaze. "I don't get why _you_ look so damn happy. They're _yer_ albums!"

"Yeah," Donnie said, nodding in agreement. "But _you_ borrowed them."

"Oh shut up!" Raph snapped, tossing one of Donatello's pillows at him, hitting him square in his face. Although it didn't make his smile disappear.

* * *

Leo passed his baby brother on the living room couch, still watching his 'Southpark' tapes. Just when he thought he was safe, Mike's voice froze him in his tracks.

"You going to the kitchen, bro?" Mikey asked, perking up on the couch.

"No," Leonardo answered, slowly turning around to look at his brother, whom he noticed had a popcorn stuck to his face."Why?" he asked, suspiciously crossing his arms.

"If you could only make me some more popcorn," Mikey pleaded, holding up his empty bowl, "you would be my favoritest brother in the _whole_ wide world."

Leo doubtfully raised an eye ridge, never breaking his gaze.

"Pleeeeeeeease?" Michelangelo begged, making puppy dog eyes at his big brother. "I love you sooo much."

"All right," Leo finally gave in, dropping his arms at his sides. "Just don't make a habit out of it, okay?"

"Scout's honor," Mike promised, saluting his brother. As he did, the snack stuck to his cheek came off and fell into the empty bowl. Mikey instantly lit up as he noticed and quickly reached down the bowl for the last popcorn; stuffing it into his mouth as if he hadn't seen food in days.

Leo sighed and went into the kitchen to put a bag of popcorn into the microwave, greeting his father at the table as he did.

"Are you having popcorn?" Splinter asked, dipping his tea-bag in his cup.

"It's for Mikey," Leo answered, closing the microwave and setting the time.

"I am very pleased the two of you are getting along again," Splinter said, putting the used tea bag aside. "Brothers should not argue."

Leo gave a small smile. "I know, Master. It's just.. sometimes he makes it really hard."

The old rat swallowed the hot tea and set the cup back down to the table. "He does," he said, nodding understandingly. "Keep in mind to be patient with him," he advised, looking at his oldest son.

"Of course," Leo promised, nodding at his father before leaving the kitchen for Raphael's room.

Once in there Leo walked up to the CD tower standing next to his hot-headed brother's mattress, crouching to be able to look over the titles. After passing tons of punk and heavier rock albums Leo would never consider listening to, he recognized 'Queen's' blue colored Best Of-album. Not long after that, he found the two 'Scorpions' Donnie had talked about.

He gripped the three CD cases in his right hand and rose to stand. Only when taking his second step, one of the CD's slipped out of his grip and dropped to the floor, two discs falling out of the open case.

Leo bent down to pick them up, a little surprised there were two CD's in the same case. After putting the first back in its place, Leo noticed by the title on the second disc, it did _not_ belong it that CD case.

In fact, he had been searching for this particular one for over a month. Leo picked up the 'Band of brothers' disc and scanned it for any scratches. Relieved to find it clean, he quickly opened the rest of the cases he held in his hands, searching for the other four missing DVD's. After not finding them there, Leo turned around to Raphael's five feet high CD tower, realizing he had some serious searching to do. Dropping to his knees in despair, he did the only thing he could think of...

* * *

Donatello had returned to fixing the toaster when a furious voice ripped through their quiet home, causing him to drop the screwdriver in shock.

_"MIKEY!"_

Don and Raphael worriedly glanced at each other, wondering what had made their oldest brother so upset. A mere second later their youngest brother stormed inside the room, closing the sub-car doors behind him, locking the lock Don had installed for his room especially.

"Hide me!" he quickly said, staring at his two brothers for support.

"Whaddid'ya do?" Raph wondered, glaring suspiciously at the frightened turtle.

"It doesn't matter," Mikey rambled, searching the room for a place to hide. "He'll kill me if he finds me. Ya gotta help me!" He turned to Donnie, frantically shaking him by his shoulders.

Once a tempered knock shook the locked doors to the room, Mike froze up, afraid that even breathing might give away his position.

"I know you're in there!" Leo hollered from the outside, banging on the doors furiously. "If you won't open this door, I'll _kick _it in myself!" he threatened, causing Donatello's face to twist in worry.

He knew how long it would take him to repair that door, not to mention the lock.

"N-no, Don, please," Mikey stammered, pleadingly grabbing after him as he rose from his chair and approached the door. When getting no sympathy from his purple masked brother, he rushed over to the mattress and hid behind Raphael, trying to disappear behind his shell.

"Get offa' me!" Raph said, trying to grab his little brother from behind.

Once Donnie had unlocked the doors and Leo had ripped them open with brutal force, Michelangelo froze in complete fear, staring at his oldest brother as he stepped inside the room.

Leo held up the 'Band of brothers' disc he had found in Raphael's room, walking past Donnie and further into the room with a menacing look in eyes. "I know what you did," he said silently, his low voice holding a kind of fury that chilled Mike down to his very bones. "I know about the CD's," Leo continued, closing in on his little brother, who fearfully pushed himself against the wall.

"And this time, Mikey," Leo growled, stopping by the edge of the mattress and staring down at his youngest brother. "I _will_ get you for it."

THE END


End file.
